From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
I have never seen...
A bison throw a cigarette butt out a window
A flock of geese blow the top off a mountain
A seal cause an oil spill
A raccoon go out and leave all the house lights on
A bobcat fight legislation to lower carbon emissions
A songbird sing "Drill Baby, Drill"
A pride of lions wage war over oil
A honey bee recycle nothing but right-wing talking points
A naked mole-rat assert that our biggest worry is global cooling
A salmon pollute a stream with mercury
An elephant claim that God says it's okay to pillage the world's natural resources because pachyderms are the "chosen ones"
A mockingbird mock public transportation
A polar bear claim that the melting ice caps are no big deal
An armadillo shrug off earthquakes related to fracking
A monarch butterfly buy enough Congress members to retain billions in oil subsidies.
A wild reindeer in the lower 48 do much of anything lately
Today is Earth Day, an event we celebrate every year to remind ourselves that we do not, in fact, have to be the biggest parasites on the third rock from the sun. We choose to be. Unlike the other parasites, we know what we're doing to this planet…and how…and why…and the kinds of things we must do to stop turning it into a ball of uninhabitable human-made garbage.
As an inhabitant of this spectacular planet, I'll continue to try and treat it with the respect it deserves, mostly by following the Four Rs: "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, and Rout the Republicans."
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold...[Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Monday, April 22, 2019
Note: Today's C&J is written with 100% recycled pixels. But please don’t ask what they're recycled from. (A giant vat in the basement is all I’m at liberty to say.)
-
By the Numbers:
Days 'til Mother's Day: 20
Days 'til the Oregon Ag Fest in Salem: 8
Length of the Mueller Report: 448 pages
Estimated amount of taxpayer money that has been spent to accommodate Trump's golf trips since he took office: $64,000,000
Percent of registered voters polled by Rasmussen (right-wing outfit) who say they would and would not, respectively, be cool with an openly-gay presidential candidate: 59%, 30%
U.S. church membership in 1948 and today, according to Gallup: 78%, 50%
Vote by the Pennsylvania House to make the eastern hellbender, aka the "snot otter," their state amphibian: 191-6
-
Puppy Pic of the Day: Just the right toy…
-
CHEERS to the aftermath. There was a brief period after the Titanic hit the iceberg when it managed to stay afloat, looking as if nothing was wrong. But then it started its slow, unavoidable plunge to the bottom of the sea. In the wake of Thursday's release of the Mueller Report, there was such a brief period of buoyancy. But less than a week later the band appears to be tuning up to play Nearer My God to Thee:
The number of Americans who approve of President Donald Trump dropped by 3 percentage points to the lowest level of the year following the release of a special counsel report detailing Russian interference in the last U.S. presidential election, according to an exclusive Reuters/Ipsos public opinion poll. […]
37 percent of adults in the United States approved of Trump’s performance in office, down from 40 percent in a similar poll conducted on April 15 and matching the lowest level of the year. That is also down [six points from] a poll conducted shortly after U.S. Attorney General William Barr circulated a summary of the report in March.
Also: the number of adults who believe Trump or someone close to him broke the law jumped from 49% after the “Barr letter” was released to 68% after the Mueller Report was released. We hear Trump was so bummed by the news that his weekend of cheating at golf brought him no joy. Poor guy.
JEERS to Trump's god squad. Let's check in with Jerry Falwell, Jr. and Franklin Graham, who are huddled with their topless pool boy (It's not what you think!!!) reading the Mueller report page by agonizing page:
"Mulligan…mulligan…mulligan, mulligan, mulligan…[Turns page]…Oh, that's definitely a mulligan…mulligan, mulligan…fetch us a couple more daiquiris, would ya Ramone…mulligan, mulligan, mulliogan…"
Truly a president chosen by God.
CHEERS to rebuffing rabid Republicans. Sixty-five years ago today, the Senate Army-McCarthy hearings began. The villain was Ann Coulter's hero (really, seriously)—a first-class jerk and pre-Ted-Cruz Ted Cruz named Joseph McCarthy, aided and abetted by future Trump lawyer Roy Cohn—for whom it went very badly:
[T]he Army–McCarthy hearings ultimately became the main catalyst in McCarthy's downfall from political power. Daily newspaper summaries were increasingly unfavorable toward McCarthy, while television audiences witnessed firsthand the unethical tactics of the junior Senator from Wisconsin.
On December 2, 1954, the Senate voted 67–22 to censure McCarthy,effectively eradicating his influence, though not expelling him from office. …
After his censuring, Senator McCarthy continued his anti-Communist oratory, often speaking to an empty or near-empty Senate chamber.
Turning increasingly to alcohol, McCarthy died of hepatitis on May 2, 1957, at age 48.
Spoiler alert: At long last, he had no sense of decency.
CHEERS to overturning a rock giving cover to a nest of vipers.* Here's something that shouldn’t get buried by Mueller: The New Yorker's Mike Spies disguised himself as an AR-15, hid in a corner of the executive suite at the "non-profit" National Rifle Association, and writes about what he saw. The big picture is: the NRA is now run mostly by an Oklahoma PR firm that produces, among other things, the "curbstomp the libs"-style videos starring failed actress Dana Loesch and other hyper-morons whose job is to scream at the camera what's on their cue cards. But Spies takes an even deeper dive, revealing some real slimy shit:
[A] small group of N.R.A.executives, contractors, and vendors has extracted hundreds of millions of dollars from the nonprofit’s budget, through gratuitous payments, sweetheart deals, and opaque financial arrangements. Memos created by a senior N.R.A.employee describe a workplace distinguished by secrecy, self-dealing, and greed, whose leaders have encouraged disastrous business ventures and questionable partnerships, and have marginalized those who object.
“Management has subordinated its judgment to the vendors,” the documents allege. “Trust in the top has eroded.” [Marc Owens, who served fourteen years as the head of the Internal Revenue Service division that oversees tax-exempt enterprises, recently reviewed these records. “The litany of red flags is just extraordinary,” he said. “The materials reflect one of the broadest arrays of likely transgressions that I’ve ever seen. There is a tremendous range of what appears to be the misuse of assets for the benefit of certain venders and people in control.” Owens added, “Those facts, if confirmed, could lead to the revocation of the N.R.A.’s tax-exempt status”—without which the organization could likely not survive.
It won’t be the first time a non-profit has gone down the tubes due to greed and mismanagement. But it'll sure be the most satisfying to watch the NRA die from a self-inflicted gun-nut wound. (I doubt I’ll be able to stifle a guffaw as I’m sending my thoughts and prayers.)
*Preemptive apologies to real vipers for the comparison. Please don't twitter-bomb me.
CHEERS to the Notorious RBG (Royal Birthday Gal). Queen Elizabeth II celebrated her birthday—holy kippers on a stick, it was number 93—yesterday. As an American descended from the patriots who violently overthrew the yoke of British oppression over 240 years ago, I should be bitter and vindictive toward her and her country full of haggis-inhaling wankers who wanted to tax the knee stockings off our legs. (Curs!!!) But, of course, I can’t. I mean, for Benny Hill’s sake, look at that face:
I was too busy over the weekend to fly across The Pond and properly celebrate in person, so I paid some codger at Piccadilly Circus to go over and spank her 93 times. May he rest in peace.
JEERS to Dicks who should've been put in the dock. And then there’s the opposite of birth: Richard Nixon---aka #37---died 25 years ago today at the age of 80-something. Whoever chose the color of his headstone knew what they were doing. But we'll be kind to his memory today and just replay the high point of his life:
-
Oh, I wish we coulda socked it to ya, Dick. Thanks for spoiling our fun, Gerald.
-
Ten years ago in C&J: April 22, 2009
JEERS to waterboarding to war. This morning the country has a bombshell to read, courtesy of McClatchy News. In a nutshell: the Bush administration approved torture so they could use it as a political tool to start the war with Iraq. Whoa...
"For most of 2002 and into 2003, Cheney and Rumsfeld, especially, were … demanding proof of the links between al Qaida and Iraq that [former Iraqi exile leader Ahmed] Chalabi and others had told them were there." ...
"Cheney's and Rumsfeld's people were told repeatedly, by CIA . . . and by others, that there wasn't any reliable intelligence that pointed to operational ties between bin Laden and Saddam, and that no such ties were likely because the two were fundamentally enemies, not allies." Senior administration officials, however, "blew that off and kept insisting that we'd overlooked something, that the interrogators weren't pushing hard enough, that there had to be something more we could do to get that information," he said.
The Pulitzer committee would be wise to file this story in its vault for next April. Great job, McClatchy. What does one wear to a criminal trial of a former president and vice president? (Since it was all about money I'm thinking “cash”mere.) [4/22/19 Update: Sadly, McClatchy was denied a Pulitzer. Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld were never held to account. And my chaps are still hanging in the closet, burnt to a crisp.]
-
And just one more…
CHEERS to Hannibal’s favorite son. Mark Twain, a man whose bullshit detector went to 11, died 109 years ago yesterday, on April 21, 1910. He went out just as he predicted—with Halley's comet. But not before Mr. Samuel Langhorne Clemens pumped out decades of literary brilliance and observational wit whose edge is still razor-sharp:
"Always respect your superiors; if you have any."
“Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.”
“Conservatism is the blind and fear-filled worship of dead radicals.”
"It is not best that we should all think alike; it is a difference of opinion that makes horse races."
“Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it.”
He was anti-slavery, pro-women's rights, clear-eyed about religion, and a supporter of labor unions. Occasionally humorous, too.Pay your respects here. But don’t offer him one of his beloved cigars, please. Those things can kill ya.
Have a tolerable Monday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
-
Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
The inside of the Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool is marvelously messy
---The Verge
-