From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Sweet Nothings
Valentine's Day is tomorrow. As usual, nearly ten billion of those addictive Sweethearts candies will be pumped out for the occasion. But they have a rival this year, courtesy of the Trump corporation, which is totally not violating any emoluments clauses by doing this so SHUT UP OR I'LL SEE YOU IN COURT. Here are some of the sayings you'll find on Tweethearts, the Valentine's Day candies America's #1 narcissist gives himself:
SO BIGLY
NO PUPPET!
BE MY AFRICAN-AMERICAN?
MY MAR-A-LAGO OR YOURS?
LEADING IN ALL THE NOT-FAKE POLLS!
VERY CLASSY
NOT A LOSER
I KNOW MANY THINGS!
#1 PUSSY GRABBER
I ♥ ME
BORED FROM ALL THE WINNING
YUGE HANDS
PUTIN LUV
FAILING NYT IS A TERRIBLE KISSER. SAD!
KICK A JUDGE
CHICKS DIG NUKE STRIKES
MELANIA, YOU ARE FORBIDDEN FROM EATING ANY OF MY TWEETHEARTS CANDIES BECAUSE YOU’LL JUST PUT ON WEIGHT. PLUS THEY’RE MINE, NOT YOURS, IT’S IN THE PRE-NUP.
May he gag on his horny goat weed.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Monday, February 13, 2017
Note: Today is Monday the 13th. The good news is, it's not unlucky. The bad news is, it's still effing Monday.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til spring: 35
Days 'til the 12th annual Burrowing Owl Festival in Cape Coral, Florida: 12
Current Trump job approval/disapproval in the latest Gallup 3-day tracking poll: 40%/55%
Percent chance that the Trump administration has "steered itself into a pointless cul-de-sac," according to Charles Krauthammer: 100%
Size of the Anthem-Cigna merger deal that was rejected by a U.S. District Judge last week because it would've likely caused an increase in premiums and cuts in benefits: $48 billion
Amount a GoFundMe page has raised to rebuild the Victoria Islamic Center in Texas, which suffered $500,000 worth of damage by an arsonist Jan. 28: $1.1 million
Number of Facebook and Twitter followers as of Dec. 31, according to AP: 1.86 billion / 319 million
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Abandoned pup Cupid gets his first pair of skis.
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CHEERS to manning the barricades. With evil Santa's Workshop dropout Jeff Sessions our new attorney general, every advocacy group not benefiting straight white rich men is preparing to control the damage from the expected blows from his judicial sledgehammer. That includes the Black Lives Matter movement, and they seem to be workin' a plan, according to Brandon Ellington Patterson in Mother Jones (awarded a National Magazine Award---the "Ellie"---for best magazine last week):
BLM leaders aim to capitalize on the energy of the nationwide protests that have unfolded since Trump's election. The local Sacramento chapter of the Black Lives Matter Global Network has canvassed neighborhoods and college campuses five times since the election and has a fast-growing email list, Tanya Faison, the founder of the chapter, told me. […]
April Goggans, who is with the Black Lives Matter Global Network chapter in Washington, D.C., said BLM organizers have been "in awe" of the throng of supporters for their recent events. "It's really important to us that every time we have a mobilization, that we have an intentional thing to call people into next," Goggans said. "The days of just rallying and going home are over because there's a lot of work that needs to be done." […]
The potential for powerful grassroots alliances has only grown since Trump entered the Oval Office, BLM leaders say. "What we saw during the inauguration weekend is going to continue," said [Dante] Barry of the historic marches around the country involving myriad activist groups. "We're all under attack. Each of us might be impacted very differently, but we now share a very similar political fate, and so it's incumbent on all of us to really be in full coordination and solidarity with other movements."
That coordination was on display over the weekend in the many Planned Parenthood rallies (including here in Portland, Maine), the NAACP demonstration in Raleigh, and contentious town hall meetings that---as usual---wildly exceeded expectations. Meanwhile, next week's rallies are already planned. They're calling it the Day of Protest For All The Protesters Who Couldn’t Protest At Last Weekend’s Protests Because They Ran Out Of Space To Protest. As always: bring comfortable shoes.
CHEERS to embracing the past. Everything old is retro-chic again! Mitch McConnell dredged up an ancient 1902 senate rule to officially "Shush!" Elizabeth Warren during the Jeff Sessions confirmation. That turned out badly for Republicans. But a wily New Jersey congressman has his hands on a 1924 law that, if pursued, could turn out even badlier:
Congress should use a rarely invoked 1924 law to examine President Donald Trump's tax returns for possible conflicts of interest and Constitutional violations, and maybe make them public, Rep. Bill Pascrell said Friday.
Pascrell, a Democrat from Paterson who serves on the Ways and Means Committee, has asked the committee’s chairman, Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas, to order the Treasury Department to provide tax returns to the committee. Brady's office did not respond to a request for comment Friday.
After privately examining returns---Pascrell is seeking 10 years' worth---the committee could decide to share them with the full House, which would in effect make them public. The 1924 law gives congressional committees that set tax policy the power to examine tax returns. It was used in 1974 when Congress looked at President Richard Nixon's returns, and in 2014 when the Ways and Means Committee released confidential tax information as part of its investigation into the Internal Revenue Service's handling of applications for nonprofit status.
It retro-boggles the mind to imagine the size of the fetid swamp full of conflicts in those tax returns. We really should drain it. For the good of the children. And Baby Jesus.
CHEERS to shameless moments crass commercialism. Speaking of Mitch McConnell's little detour into the misogyny quicksand last week, Elizabeth Warren's senate campaign has created the official, definitive "Nevertheless, She Persisted" t-shirt. And you---[pulls out spinny pinwheel hypnotism thingy and holds it two inches from your eyes]---wish to buy one or even several this instant, yessss you do, yessss you do:
A $25 donation gets you one of these, the finest of garments, woven from the downiest fibers here in the country we call home. Your "Nevertheless, She Persisted" t-shirt complements anything, from a sassy blazer to a sexy skort to khakis with or without the pleats to all the latest tats and piercings and even your shoes! Get one today and be the envy of all life forms. Click here now. Goooooood. My hypnosis worked. Now go get me a beer.
CHEERS and JEERS to God's dandruff. I always say that if you're gonna have winter ya might as well have snow on the ground. I should probably say that a little more quietly, though, because today Portland, Maine is as white as a Trump cabinet meeting as Ma Nature drops two more feet of snow on top of the foot we got last week. (Luckily, we remembered to stock up on all the essentials---candy corn, Bacardi, tiaras---ahead of time). Here's what the latest map from the socialist commies at the information-redistributing National Weather Service looks like:
Good news for ski resorts, kids ("Snow day!"), and private plow operators. Bad news for restaurants counting on a Valentine's Day windfall because this thing could sock us in for awhile, and another big storm is on the way for Thursday. Up in Augusta, our tea party governor, Paul LePage, sprang into action yesterday and issued his usual emergency bulletin urging drivers to stay off the roads. So remember, motorists: make sure you careen wildly down the sidewalks instead or you might get a ticket.
CHEERS to movin' and groovin'. Congrats to the winners last night at the Grammy Awards, including the late David Bowie (who went five-for-five in his categories), Patton Oswalt for Best Comedy Album (Talking For Clapping), Carol Burnett for Best Spoken Word (In Such Good Company: Eleven Years Of Laughter, Mayhem, And Fun In The Sandbox), 83-year-old Willie Nelson for Best Traditional Pop Vocalist (Summertime: Willie Nelson Sings Gershwin) and, holy cow, John Freaking Williams won his 23rd Grammy for his score to Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens. (Dude just turned 85.) And, thanks to the award bestowed on Chance the Rapper for best rap performance, the world finally has its first Grammy-winning song with the words…
Tippy toes around my crib in their robes, just their robes
Half a milli' in the safe, another in the pillowcase
Codeine got me movin' slower than a caterpillar race
Fuck is wrong with you? What you thinkin'?
Fuck you thought it was?
I need Popeye percocets and on the Carter buzz
And if that label try to stop me
There gon' be some crazy Weezy fans waitin' in the lobby
Mula, baby
Mark my words, DJs. That's got "high school prom slow dance" written all over it.
CHEERS to the original Tarzan the Ape Man. Yesterday was the 208th birthday of evolution guy Charles Darwin---aka Charles Darwin Day. The creationism crowd, which spends most of its time mocking the idea that we evolved from chimpanzees, spent their day the usual way: picking fleas out of each other's hair and flinging poo.
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Ten years ago in C&J: February 13, 2007
JEERS to the Maine Sunday Telegram. As a sidebar to a story on a Maine-connected soldier who was recently killed in Iraq, my hometown paper printed a list of casualties under the banner, "SOLDIERS WITH MAINE TIES WHO DIED IN WAR ON TERROR"...even though Iraq had nothing to do with the war on terrorism. Sometimes I think they do it just to piss me off.
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And just one more…
JEERS to Gun FAIL 101. It Seems Like It Was Only---[BLAM!!!]---Yesterday. Eleven years ago today, after the Cheney team sat on the news for a day, America finally learned that the vice president went hunting and bagged himself a lawyer:
Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot and wounded a campaign contributor during a weekend quail hunt on a friend's South Texas ranch, local authorities and the vice president's office said Sunday.
The wounded man, 78-year-old Harry Whittington, was in intensive care at a Corpus Christi hospital after being hit by several pellets of birdshot Saturday afternoon, hospital spokesman Peter Banko told CNN.
That was the signal to unleash the hounds of late night:
"Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot a man during a quail hunt ... making 78-year-old Harry Whittington the first person shot by a sitting veep since Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton, of course, was shot in a duel with Aaron Burr over issues of honor, integrity and political maneuvering. Whittington? Mistaken for a bird."
---Jon Stewart
"But all kidding aside, and in fairness to Dick Cheney, every five years he has to shed innocent blood or he violates his deal with the devil."
---Jimmy Kimmel
"To the vice president's credit, he did own up to it. On FOX News he said the fault was his, he can't blame anybody else. It's amazing---the only time you get accountability out of this administration is when they are actually holding a smoking gun."
---Bill Maher
I bring this up not only to mark one of many jaw-dropping milestones during the previous accidency…er, presidency, but to remind you that Deadeye Dick is still alive and roaming the countryside. Lock your doors.
Oh, and rest in peace, Al Jarreau, gone too soon at 76. The United States would be in a much better mood every day if Mornin’ was our national anthem. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
“Where do we have a better chance of finding life---Europa or the Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool? At this point, it’s a tossup. Both deserve exploration, and I’d hate to have to choose between them.”
---Doug Vakoch, METI International
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