One Big Happy...
While journalists, pundits and bloggers with big fancy degrees and lots of "experience" pore over the resumes and records of Joe Biden's proposed cabinet, I've decided to tap a different well to get a truer feeling for how the team will get along with their boss. It all starts with this: Biden is a Scorpio.
How will he get along with cabinet members who fall under different astrological signs? According to what I read on the some astrology web site I found using The Google (being a Leo, I’m just naturally tenacious that way), the future looks promising. Let's take a look:
Continued...
Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris (Libra): This is a team that naturally perfect for detective work, as together your problem solving skills are incredible and you compliment each other in a way that others signs can't come close to. Scorpio has the ultimate desire to figure out all details, while Libra is dedicated to the balance needed in fairness and being morally ethic.
Biden and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, & Chief of Staff Ron Klain (Leo): While Leo can take the lead and be in the spotlight, Scorpio is happy to work behind the scenes with precise planning and organization. This is a perfect match of strengths being highlighted and used for the most lucrative and beneficial to all. Be sure that roles are clear, with concise instruction so everyone knows their job to keep from problems arising.
Biden and Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland, Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack, & VA Secretary Denis McDonough (Sagittarius): This is a great combination of fire and water elements coming together and making quite a great impact in a work environment. Where Sagittarians needs structure and purpose, Scorpio energy helps to focus appropriately. Scorpio gains equal benefit from Sagittarius's emotional influence and all in all a great compatibility.
Biden and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Nicholas Mayorkas & HUD Secretary Marcia Fudge (Uh oh…also Scorpios!): Of all the Zodiac, only another Scorpio can truly understand you, and on a level that most just don't get. This combination does not take much effort whatsoever and problems and challenges aren't usual.
Well, one thing we know as Team America faces the cleanup of the century: it'll never be boring.
And now, our feature presentation…
-
Cheers and Jeers for Monday, December 21, 2020
Note: Our daily note has to work on Christmas this year so we're giving it today off. We'd like to take this opportunity to thank it for all of its diligent efforts to inform us of stuff throughout the year, and we hope it's having fun in Vegas cheating on its spouse with a buxom Scrabble pad. —Mgt.
-
By the Numbers:
Days 'til inauguration day: 30
Minimum number of tweets Trump has sent out since the election: 729
Number of those tweets that acknowledged the coronavirus death toll: 0
Percent of men who say they use formal titles—like "Dr."—when referring to other men and women, respectively, according to ABC News: 72%, 49%
Percent of women who say they use formal titles, regardless of their colleagues' gender: 96%
Number of people found guilty by a French court in the attacks on the offices of Charlie Hebdo magazine in Paris: 14
Number of troops, horses, and cannon, respectively, Washington took across the Delaware river on Christmas night in 1776: 2,400 / 200 / 18
-
Puppy Pic of the Day: Monday of Christmas week…
-
JEERS to a pre-Ho-Ho-Ho reality check. I know, I know. It's Christmas and Kwanzaa and Festivus and Boxing Day week, and you're not in the mood—nor should you be—for a bunch of hard news that'll just kill the buzz. So we'll keep this roundup as short ‘n sweet as we can:
» Russia hacked into every government agency in America and stole our toilet paper. President Trump vowed to take decisive action starting on January 21.
» Jared Kushner set up a shell company to bilk his father-in-law's red-hatted cult out of hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign donations. Somehow I'm cool with that.
» Republicans in the Senate continued to theatrically "argue" with each other over details in a Covid-19 relief bill, which finally seemed to move forward yesterday. Congress also moved heaven and earth on Friday to pass an official United States budget…for a whopping two days.
» 2020 was likely the hottest year on record, some say hotter even than our current First Lady's lesbian porn.
» Space Force enlistees will be called "Guardians." To show the depth of their allegiance and discipline, they will only be able to say "I am Groot" while on duty.
» Yesterday was the deadline for Brexit negotiations to wind down, four-and-a-half years after Britain voted to destroy itself rather than welcome immigrants. Since conservatives are still in charge over there, naturally things are still a blinkered mess.
» New Zealand, as usual, is insufferably competent and victorious.
Moments from now, these stories will be sealed in concrete, wrapped in chains, and thrown off a pier in an undisclosed location. If Susan Collins happens to get accidentally sealed in with them, oops our bad.
JEERS to keeping track of America’s fugliest numbers. The mighty Covid-19 Wurlitzer plays on with 77 million cases worldwide—over 20 percent of them in the U.S. Our weekly tradition of maintaining a benchmark of the still-escalating awfulness for the C&J historical record continues, so let’s check the most depressing tote board in the world as our death toll now surpasses the population of America’s 60th-largest city Lexington Kentucky:
6 months ago: 2.1 million confirmed cases. 118,000 deaths.
3 months ago: 7 million confirmed cases. 204,000 deaths
1 month ago: 11.5 million confirmed cases. 251,000 deaths
This morning: 18 million confirmed cases. 325,000 deaths
Today's notable Covid event will involve President-elect Biden, who's expected to get his first dose of the vaccine on TV so the public can hear him say, "It's okay. I'm fine." As opposed to Mitch McConnell, who took it in private last week so the public wouldn’t hear him say, "It's okay. My face always looks like it's melting."
CHEERS to hitting another milestone on this crazy tilt-a-whirl we call Earth. Autumn ended with a gentle sputter-sputter-wheeze at 5:02 EST this morning—when the sun was directly over the Tropic of Capricorn, or 23.5° south latitude, and this year with Saturn and Jupiter snuggling closer than they've been in 800 years—and will be replaced with the season popularly known as "Is it !#&%!! spring yet?" Today is also the shortest and darkest day of the year, so at least we can look forward to teeny tiny slivers of extra light through late June. Plus: nothing tastes better in winter than steaming clam chowder chugged from an L.L. bean boot during a blizzard. And now, here it is: your Moment of Stonehenge (now livestreaming)…
Bonus winter tip: Remember that during ice storms, there's no need to shovel or salt your sidewalk. A public service message from the Society of Unscrupulous Chiropractors.
-
BRIEF SANITY BREAK
-
-
END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
-
CHEERS to Pine Tree State roots. Happy to say that President Obama's U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice will be a major force in the Biden White House, seeing as she’s been hired to be the Joe's domestic policy adviser. Turns out she's practically my sister:
Rice’s family has deep roots in Maine.
Her grandparents immigrated to Portland from Jamaica in 1912, working such jobs as janitor, shipper, maid and seamstress as they sought to save money and build lives in the city. All five of the couple’s children graduated from college, including Rice’s mother, Lois Dickson Rice, who was valedictorian and class president at Portland High School before attending Radcliffe College.
She’s expected to play an active role in the Biden administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. Health care, immigration and tackling racial inequality are also expected to be among the top issues for the domestic policy shop next year. The 56-year-old Rice will be among the most prominent Black women in Biden’s administration.
Once again I feel an obligation—driven only by patriotism—to invoke the Billeh Principle of expertise by osmosis: Ms. Rice has Maine ties + I have Maine ties = I am now a senior member of Biden's inner circle. I prefer a corner suite but I'll settle for a cubicle in the Oval Office.
JEERS to bad spelling. On today's date in 1989, Vice President Dan Quayle sent out 30,000 Christmas cards that said: "May our nation continue to be the beakon of hope to the world." Really:
We're sure he regerts the mistake.
-
Ten years ago in C&J: December 21, 2010
CHEERS to a bit more order in the court. Lest we forget, another major obstacle Republicans have thrown up to thwart the Obama administration is gridlock over judicial confirmations. For no other reason but to be assholes, they've blocked nominee after nominee month after month. But now there seems to be some movement. Four judges were approved late last week and Harry Reid's office says they're "just a start." They better be. A cursory glance at Obama appointee confirmations versus those of the previous five presidents shows an appalling mockery of Senate rules. Yet another reason why those rules need to be changed on January 5 so the point is made clear to the smirking do-nothing crowd: you abuse your privileges, you lose your privileges. What's the difference between a GOP senator and a three year-old? Beats me.
-
And just one more…
CHEERS to making a joyful noise. If you’re wondering why you’re hearing all those orgasm carols on the radio, there’s a good reason: today is Global Orgasm for Peace Day. Your mission, should you decide to ahhhhhccept it:
This is the 8th year of the Global Orgasm for World Peace, held annually on the December Solstice & New Year.
Millions of satisfied people around the world have participated, saying Yes! to World Peace in their own special way.
Through links with the Noosphere Project at Princeton University, and more recently The Center for Subtle Activism, the Global O has been able to contribute in a unique way to the new sciences of the collective mind.
We ask that you vote for a brighter future with your orgasm. Use it to pray for Peace. With you will be millions of people around the world.
What can we say? O come all ye faithful. Come one, come all. Come rain or come shine. Just don’t come on-a my house.
Have a tolerable Monday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
-
Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
‘Don’t Book Bill in Portland Maine’: Rachel Maddow Speaks Exclusively On Making of Her Show, The Competition, What’s Next in the Cheers and Jeers Era
—Rachel Maddow
-