Last week: Raise the debt ceiling, even if we have to break the filibuster to do it. Oopsie. No, no, no, it’s OK if you raise the debt ceiling, but only as far and as long as I tell you. This week: #EnforceTheSubpoenas #EnforceTheSubpoenasnow and set precedents. From now on: #EndTheFilibuster #EndTheFilibusterNow. Pass #HR1, #FreedomToVoteAct and #HR4, #JohnLewisVotingRightsActs, hundreds more.
Plan to go out on Halloween as the McConnell Grim Reaper Baby Cyber Ninja Turtle.
Points if someone can get me an image. In the meantime, how about this?
The Turtles - Grim Reaper Of Love
Eleven Republican Senators, including McConnell, voted for cloture last week, giving Democrats the 60 votes needed to continue on to raising the Debt Limit on their own with only 50 votes. Not one Republican joined them. This was all down to McConnell, who had vowed not to help in any way on raising the Debt Limit, but then panicked when Biden started talking seriously about filibuster reform. Even Republicans are now blasting McConnell as a traitor to the Party and the Country for doing so.
Ted Cruz blasts McConnell for surrendering on debt limit just as GOP had Democrats squirming
Republican Revolt Against McConnell Debt-Limit Deal Fizzles
All day long, there has been a buzz about a Republican “revolt” against the temporary debt-limit deal Mitch McConnell proposed on Wednesday that Senate Democrats reluctantly accepted. Led predictably by perennial presidential candidates Ted Cruz and Rand Paul, the fight against heading off a financial collapse by punting a debt-limit crisis until December also drew support from perennial troublemaker Lindsey Graham.
Key debt-limit vote sparks major fight among Senate Republicans
And then they voted, and it passed. And then,
Donald Trump calls for McConnell's ouster after giving Dems debt 'lifeline': 'Mitch is not the guy' to lead
and is roundly ignored by Senate Republicans.
Out in Make Bizarro World Great Again World, the eleven who voted with the Democrats are being denounced in far starker terms, which I see no need to sully your eyes and brain with. The R base is in disarray. OK. But let us focus on what their leadership is going to do next.
I got on a tear last night. Can you tell?
Anyway, let’s start with a bit of timeless wisdom, and a dose of maximum snark.
There is but one thing of real value—to cultivate truth & justice, and to live without anger in the midst of lying & unjust men.
Marcus Aurelius
To sit in solemn silence in a dull, dark dock,
In a pestilential prison with a lifelong lock,
Awaiting the sensation of a short, sharp shock,
From a cheap and chippy chopper on a big black block!
G&S, The Mikado
Only the metaphorical axe, though, please.
I’m not the only one on a tear, of course.
Who is on the List, You Ask?
I've Got a Little List (with lyrics) / The Mikado / Gilbert and Sullivan [updated with current British and US political snark]
Indeed! A wonderful question!
- Mitch McConnell on shutting down the government, and in December on the debt ceiling again.
- Joe Manchin, the West Virginia ham, on whether he loves the filibuster as a guarantee of bipartisanship, as he has said, or whether we should “bring the pain” to the Republicans with a talking filibuster, or a reverse filibuster (41 Rs on the Senate floor continuously to block cloture, rather than 60 votes to pass it), as he has also said. Or whether he loves coal so much that he is willing to see his and his son’s companies fail rather than go into much more profitable solar and wind on abundant sliced-off WV mountaintops. Or what sort of pork would get him to vote in the interests of West Virginians.
- Kyrsten Sinema on whether she really is an anti-tax, pro-lobbyist Republican’t corporate stooge, or a Green Party climate activist, and whether we could make her a better offer, yanowudimean? Amirite? Nothing personal, just sausage-making. She just said that she wants to cut $100 gigabucks from Global Warming funding, according to a Times report that she denies.
- Mittens Rmoney on voting to destroy the economy, like all those companies he sucked dry.
- Susan Collins on ever being concerned enough to come out of the Republican Dark Shadows. Well, she does say she wants to codify Roe v. Wade, but not enough to support the current Dem women’s healthcare protection bill.
- Fraudster etc. Steve Bannon on going to prison when he loses his subpoena fight in the courts.
- Jeffrey Clark, who sold Trump on a plan to overturn slates of electors and engage in a hostile takeover of the DoJ. Later, he got loudly hired by the RWNJ dark money New Civil Liberties Alliance to pursue bogus cases against mask mandates and such, and then mysteriously and silently unhired in the middle of the night.
- Rudy Giuliani, who turns out to have been a crook ever since he got the Russian Mob to help him prosecute the Italian Mob, and an idiot since he put the NYC emergency response center in the World Trade Center.
- Everybody in TFG’s multitudinous companies and political organizations on going to prison to protect one who would never think of protecting any of them, now that he has no pardon power.
- The SCOTUS Six after this current season of soap opera plays out, and we take up real Court reform. Or possibly when they realize they are about to do something so totally heinous that even they realize we’re coming for them.
- Everybody in Congress who voted for the 1/6 steal and against the Constitution, who will one day say Donald Who? Didn’t he get coffee for someone, somewhere, sometime?
- Facebook. Other social media platforms have banned TFG, covid or global warming grifting and hoaxes, Russian trolls and bots, and other disinformation.
It’s a lot like what Rumsfeld once called a target-rich environment.
As to TFG...
the Once and Future [censored], fuggeddaboudit. No matter how many charges we Lock Him Up on, he will never admit nuttin’, just as Roy Cohn taught him. No, you’re just on a fishing expedition, you’re teh grandstanding, witch-hunting ganefs, paskudnyaks, haters, hoaxers, cheaters, election stealers…
I tell you what. I don’t have the energy to fill out that voluminous list. Let us, as the lawyers say, consider it included by reference.
News You Can Do Something About
Disgusted Cheerleaders Demand NFL Release Report on Washington Football Team’s ‘Boys Club’
Change.org petition: NFL & WASHINGTON FOOTBALL TEAM - DO THE RIGHT THING FOR WOMEN!
NFL: Make Washington’s sexual misconduct investigation PUBLIC!
Washington Football Team (WFT): Reinstate the cheerleaders and give them a seat at the table!
The NFL must do the right thing and make the sexual misconduct investigation of the WFT public AND hold Dan Snyder accountable for the history of serial sexual harassment within his organization.
40,261 have signed. Let’s get to 50,000!
Today’s News and Beyond
#EnforceTheSubpoenasNow, criminal referrals, civil contempt, fake executive privelege, yadda yadda yadda.
Bannon is due at the Jan. 6 Committee today, having loudly spat his defiance of their subpoena. The Committee has announced its intention to take up contempt charges, likely next week, the first time the full Committee will be able to meet.
Meadows, Patel, and Scavino are also due to appear today, but nobody knows what they will actually do.
Five of the organizers of the 1/6 rally have shared documents with the Committee. We should hear more today.
Former Acting AG Rosen appears before the Committee today.
More fear.
More rage.
More insanity.
More intransigence as long as no actual deadlines loom that might threaten the filibuster.
Court Picking
CBS: Biden's Supreme Court commission nears end with reviews of court packing, term limits, shadow docket. Progressives may be disappointed.
No thank you, CBS. I don’t need you to tell me what I am going to think. I can just ask myself.
Good morning, Mr. Stephens! And how do you find yourself these fine crisp autumn mornings?
Why, I just throw back the covers, and there I am!
Collected by Bennett Cerf
Virginia Elections
To be held Nov. 2, but with endless polling and commentary today and every day. The Doomsters and Gloomsters are out in force.
McAuliffe is ahead. So are other Democrats.
When in danger,
When in doubt,
Run in circles,
Scream and shout.
What not to do, from US Army training manual. You can comfortably leave that to the Rs in Disarray
Postcards to Voters, the Truth Brigade, Fair Fight, LWV, and vast multitudes of others are on this. We know how to GOTV. Our voters are angry.
Your Regularly Scheduled Good News that has Actually Been
"...a decision that came a day after Georgia investigators told the court they were unable to find any counterfeit ballots."
https://t.co/7gMppslL4p?amp=1
Biden Tackles Port Backlogs
It’s called the Everything Shortage in popular parlance, and the Supply Chain Backup in the business. Used cars, chicken, chlorine for swimming pools, computer chips,…
There's a backlog at U.S. ports. Here's how Biden hopes to get you your goods, faster
TL;DR Biden yesterday started directing the affected ports to run 24/7 until all of the container ships now riding at anchor (80 at Port of LA alone) have been unloaded (and reloaded and sent on their way), with goods on trucks and trains to everywhere. Walmart, FedEx, and UPS are also increasing hours. Nlobody knows how long it will take the ports and shippers to do so.
Today we have some Good News. We’re gonna help speed up the delivery of goods all across America. After weeks of negotiation, of working with my team, and with the major union retailers and freight movers, the Port of Los Angeles announced today that it’s gonna begin operating 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
There’s a lot of double overtime in there for a short period, so dock workers and transport workers won’t complain too hard. Although we are currently short 60,000 truck drivers. These are jobs with pretty good pay, but for long-haul truckers, the absolute worst hours.
Statuary World
Mexico City to swap Columbus statue for one of indigenous woman
The statue was removed last year after indigenous rights activists threatened to tear it down.
Claudia Sheinbaum said it will be replaced by a replica of a pre-Columbian statue known as the Young Woman of Amajac.
Brain and Brain; What is Brain?
A new study from Oxford University offers the worrisome suggestion that the coronavirus not only can shrink the brain, but also reduce “gray matter thickness,” damage tissue in areas associated with the sense of smell, and cause more than 60 other long-term changes.
Octopocklewocks Done Is Got Me!
H/T Pogo
#DoNotComply with this DEMAND to retweet the cutest baby octopus in the world how very dare I
#DoNotComply (with mask and vaccine rules) has been trending on Twitter, so I am seeing whether reporting such disinformation can have any effect. Maybe we can organize to report it en masse. Of course there is also much pointing and laughing.
Shatner
"Suddenly you're through the blue and into black"
Star Trek actor William Shatner, 90, says his experience of flying into space was "so moving" and "unbelievable"
Everybody who has done it, including former astronaut Scott Kelly doing commentary for NASA, agrees that it can neither be explained nor imagined in advance.
A few days ago Shatner joked about his Twilight Zone episode, Nightmare at 20,000 Feet, with someone looking in the window.
(Updated)
Orangutans were dying of LONELINESS, until these RASCALS moved in with them. See what happened next.
Don’t Touch Me! You Don’t Know Me That Well!
H/T Flip Wilson
"NO! Don't! DON'T Touch ME!"
Youtube Funny Animals'Life
Flutterbies
The butterfly that drinks caterpillars alive to bolster its pheromones
Pollution→Death
Whodathunkit?
Air pollution likely cause of up to 6m premature births, study finds
That’s bad news. But it is Good News that we know more of what we are trying to prevent. Like cooking over smoky fires with inadequate ventilation among the poor of the world.
Wind
No NIMBY in our back yard.
Biden to expand offshore wind turbines to nearly all US coastlines
Bali, Covid
Indonesia Covid: Slow start as Bali re-opens to foreign tourists
R→D
Oklahoma's top public education official has switched her party affiliation to Democratic and announced a bid for governor, blasting Republican Kevin Stitt's handling of the pandemic.
Movies! In! Spaaaaaace!
A Russian actress and director were launched to the International Space Station to spend 12 days making the world’s first movie shot in orbit, getting in ahead of Tom Cruise and NASA
International Space Station to spend 12 days making the world’s first movie shot in orbit, getting in ahead of Tom Cruise and NASA #WSJWhatsNow
Google Bans Global Warming Disinfo
But calls it Climate Change, which is itself disinfo.
Google will "prohibit ads for, and monetization of, content that contradicts well-established scientific consensus around the existence and causes of climate change." The policy applies to advertisers, publishers that run Google ads and YouTube creators.
You see what I mean?
Science! Animals! Weirdness!
Grouper Sex
'Explosive sex' wins top prize at Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Wildlife Photographer of the Year: 'Explosive sex' wins top prize An image of a bursting cloud of eggs and sperm as groupers mate in the Pacific is the judges' pick.
Where’s Walrus?
Walrus counting from space: How many tusked beasts do you see?
I have taken part in amateur/professional collaborations like this, marking craters on Mars and damaged houses in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria.
O2 on Luna
The Intruder
Funny or Cry
If you have nothing good to say about anybody, come here and sit by me.
Alice Roosevelt Longworth
The Boys and Girls
will now appropriately play us out.
Grateful Dead - Shakedown Street (Studio Version)
Don’t tell me this town ain’t got no heart.