Hooray for History!
The Inflation Reduction Act now joins the New Deal, Social Security, the Civil Rights Act, Medicare, and the Affordable Care Act in the pantheon of signature Democratic achievements on behalf of the American people. Take a moment and let that sink in.
While victorious President Biden and a small army of surrogates fan out across the country to promote the new law, the Environmental Defense Fund reserved a million bucks worth of national airtime to run a post-passage version of this ad. We’ve already seen it here in Maine. It’s good:
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Democrats should take a page from the ad. It clearly and concisely demonstrates what’s in it for Joe and Jane Lunchbucket. (And it’s a lot.) More like this, please.
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, August 17, 2022
Note: If you don’t eat your paste, you won’t grow up to be big and strong. Remember: Five servings a day fuels you up for work and play! —C&J Office of Nutritional Superiority That Will Not be Questioned
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til Chocolate Pecan Pie Day: 3
Days 'til the Corn Palace Festival in Mitchell, South Dakota: 7
Percent chance that Rudy Giuliani is now a target in the 2020 Georgia election fraud investigation: 100%
Amount expected to be spent in Maine on solar energy over the next 5 years: $540 million
Age of Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla, who just tested positive for Covid: 60
Number of years, according to bankruptcy court testimony, that a customer identified as "Magnolia" took to save $1 million before losing all of it by investing in Voyager Digital crypto currency: 24 years
Date on which the Artemis 1 space mission lifts off for the moon: 8/29/22
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Mid-week Rapture Index: 188 (including 5 "Debt & Trades" and 1 name that's even higher than Jesus's). Soul Protection Factor 24 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Fala flashback...
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CHEERS to doing your civic duty. Voters in three red states marched to the polls yesterday to choose the candidates from their party who will face the candidates from the other party on November 8th (83 days from now). Because South Dakota, Wyoming, and Alaska exist in strange and exotic time zones, we on the east coast may not hear about the final numbers for several years. But because they float in a special time-space ether cloud, you can peruse the results from the Daily Kos Elections Team here. The one thing I can say this morning is something I never thought would come outta my maw, and it reflects the extent to which the so-called "Republican" party—which no longer has any interest in being a republic—has fallen. This is so gag-worthy:
I'm sorry Liz Cheney lost her primary for reelection.
Fly, piggies, fly.
CHEERS to public opinion. God only knows how the FBI seizure of top-secret documents from the pleasure palace of the former 45th president will shake out. But it sure looks like the now-private citizen is in for a world of hurt. And so far that appears to be just fine with a sizable chunk of We The People:
More Americans approve of the FBI’s raid on former President Donald Trump‘s Mar-a-Lago resort home than disapprove—by a 12-point margin.
Respondents to the [Politico-Morning Consult] poll were asked “Do you approve or disapprove of the FBI’s decision to conduct a search warrant on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida?”
Overall, 49 percent approve, while only 37 percent disapprove, with another 13 percent responding “Don’t know/no opinion.” There’s an overwhelming partisan divide, but independents closely mirror the overall numbers at 47% to 33%.
Subtract the law enforcement-hating MAGA cult and you're talking roughly 80 percent of Americans with a functioning brain who approve of the search. Two words for AG Garland: please proceed.
CHEERS to VJ Day. Seventy-seven years ago this week, America was celebrating the end of the war in the Pacific. Our youngest W.W.II vets are now 95 or older, so today it's our pleasure to slip a nip 'o scotch in their Ensure with a wink and a "thank you"—that was a war that needed to be fought.
Interesting side note: the Afghanistan war that, lest we forget, President Barack Obama started in 2001 and President Joe Biden ended in 2021, dragged on sixteen years longer than the Second World War. Not that we're counting. Mainly because back in 2015 we ran out of fingers to count.
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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JEERS to activist judges. 330 years ago this week, in 1692, four innocent men and an innocent woman were hanged on Gallows Hill for "practicing witchcraft" in Salem, Massachusetts. To this day Justice Alito is still outraged by what happened back then. He doesn’t think they were tortured nearly enough.
JEERS to robot Rover. We're headed for a terminator world, folks. Only this terminator has fleas…and fires grenades:
At a Russian arms fair this week, a developer showed off their new creation, and the logical next step of the robot arms race: a Boston Dynamics-style dog robot with an RPG strapped to its back.
A video uploaded by RIA Novosti, a Russian-state owned news agency, shows the robot in action, in which the robot tiptoes around before laying down on the ground, its RPG pointed forward. The robot itself is dressed in something akin to the black outfit of a ninja, its eyes, which are presumably cameras, peeking out. … “When used in combat, the robotic dog can be engaged in target designation, patrolling and security,” the post added.
Not to be outdone, the United States military says it'll soon unveil an effective countermeasure to the grenade-launching robot dog: the grenade-launching robot rolled-up newspaper.
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Ten years ago in C&J: August 17, 2012
CHEERS to businesspeople with brains. A new survey of corporate muckety-mucks from around the world reveals what they think about our upcoming election. By a two-to-one-margin, they believe the best pick for President of the United States in 2012 is (SPOILER ALERT! IT'S BARACK OBAMA): Barack Obama. And in other news, I've just been informed that I suck at spoiler alerts.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to the left-wing echo chamber. Listeners of Daily Kos’s Kagro in the Morning Show know that its host, Daily Kos stalwart-since-forever David Waldman, is an excellent radio host. Tough. Fair. Snarky. Fact-based. And fixated on making this a better world for his family, friends and neighbors, their neighbors, and their neighbors’ neighbors.
What you may not know is that it was eleven years ago this week when he first took to the airwaves. His "Sirius Period" with Armando was followed shortly after by a move to Netroots Radio, and today "Kagro in the Morning”—including regular DK front page guests Greg Dworkin and Joan McCarter—airs live at 9am ET five days a week and you can listen to the podcast any old time.
The Kagro in the Morning Show also helps David put food on his family by bringing in a modest amount of income through the support of listeners like you, and I encourage you to pass along some financial support via the various options he provides every day in his morning post here at Daily Kos. Then settle in at 9 o’clock ET and listen as he kicks off year #12 with another two-hour dose of extra-strength truth-to-power.
Happy broadcastiversary, KITM. Keep talkin'. I think you're starting to wear the other side down.
Have a happy humpday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
“I believe that Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool splashers are the most persecuted identity in America, passed over for any kind of promotion or even for being hired in the job place.”
—Marjorie Taylor-Greene
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