Today’s C&J is brought to you by the number…
Can you say “twenty-two”? Good. Very good.
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, September 6, 2023
Note: Newsrooms across America report a shortage of films at 11. Film at 11. Maybe.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til autumn: 17
Days 'til the 57th Morton Pumpkin Festival in Illinois: 7
Year-over-year drop in lumber prices: -14%
Number of rain days in Portland, Maine during our meteorological summer (June through August): 46
Number of times the temperature in Portland hit 90 this summer: 0
Reported incidents of unruly passengers (mostly narcissistic, drunk MAGA assholes probably) on flights last summer and this summer, respectively, according to the FAA: 586 / 747
Percent chance that Trump's Fulton County trial will be televised: 100%
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Mid-week Rapture Index: 185 (including 3 supernatural events and 1 clown barber for Christ). Soul Protection Factor 18 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Adapting to playtime…
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JEERS to the return of the do-nothings. That stench you smelled yesterday was Congress ramping up for another stretch of incompetence, intransigence and invective. Among the things they're not expected to get done: all the things they say they're expecting to get done.
CHEERS to a feisty day in The Lege. Here's a partial transcript of yesterday's opening impeachment hearing for disgraced Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is being charged with all kinds of crimey business:
"Y'all y'all y'all!"
"Well, y'all y'all y'all!"
"Barbeque barbeque barbeque!"
"Oh yeah?!! Well, remember the Alamo, y'all!"
"Y'all y'all y'all Sam Houston Lone Star cattle rustlin'!"
"Stetson armadillo, y'all! And another thing: Tumbleweeds barbeque, y'all!"
"Cowboy boots! Shit kickers! Waffle stompers! And boot scoot boogie, y’all!"
"Well, yeehaw, y'all! Ropin' and ridin' them doggies, cowboy!!!"
"Walker Texas Ranger y'all! Yeeeeeeeeee-haw!!!"
"Oil, y'all! Black gold! Texas tea!”
[Plaster rains from the ceiling as all the legislators start shooting their guns in the air]
The hearings will continue this morning just as soon as the GOP legislators are cut loose from their bonds in their billionaire benefactors' S&M dungeons.
TALLY HO! to remembering a literal moment in time. One year ago today the British Empire, which now consists of England, Wales, Stonehenge, parts of Ireland, the cat in front of 10 Downing Street and, representing Scotland, a giant plate of haggis, welcomed their new Tory prime minister to office. Her job: last longer than her failed Tory predecessor Boris Johnson. The new kid was Liz Truss:
> 1996 graduate of Merton College in Oxford
> 1996-2005: worked for Shell Oil and Cable & Wireless.
> Won a seat in the House of Commons in 2010
> 2016-2022: served as Justice Secretary, Lord Chancellor, Secretary to the Treasury, International Trade Secretary, and Foreign Secretary.
> Wants Russia to be booted from Ukraine and knocked down to a lower peg economically.
> One CNN commentator described her as “a political chameleon who has gone from a radical who called for the abolition of the monarchy to a flag-bearer of the Euroskeptic right wing of the Conservative Party.”
> Technically a Christian, but sleeps in on Sunday morning.
Ol’ Liz lasted a whopping 44 days, and is now in the history books as the U.K. prime minister who served the shortest term. I’d wish her a happy anniversary, but apparently she sleeps in every morning now.
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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END OF BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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CHEERS to picking up a House seat in 2024. Seems them 'Publicans down thar Alabama-way just ain't too bright—either that or what we have here is a failure to communicate. But maybe the third time's the charm, as another federal court has ordered the white supremacist party to allow Black Alabamans into the political system:
A federal court blocked a newly-drawn Alabama congressional map because it didn’t create a second majority-Black district, as the Supreme Court had ordered earlier this year.
In a unanimous decision from a three-judge panel, which had overseen the case before it reached the Supreme Court, the judges wrote that they were “disturbed” by Alabama’s actions in the case. “We are deeply troubled that the State enacted a map that the State readily admits does not provide the remedy we said federal law requires,” the judges, two of whom were appointed by former President Donald Trump, wrote.
So now it's up to a special master to redraw the districts. Memo to Alabama Democrats: if the special master turns out to be Governor Kay Ivey sporting glasses and a fake mustache, call the police and have 'em check for a body in her basement.
JEERS to today's lame game. The object is simple: guess which progressive Democrat(s) said these things about the 45th president's theft of classified documents from the United States government:
"Enforce all laws concerning the protection of classified information. No one will be above the law."
"One of the first things we must do is to enforce all classification rules and to enforce all laws relating to the handling of classified information."
"Any government employee who engaged in this kind of behavior would be barred from handling classified information."
"That is the most confidential stuff. Classified. That's classified. You go to prison when you release stuff like that."
"Classified information; he should go to jail for that for many, many years."
"He must pay a very big price for this, as others have before him. This should never to happen again!!!"
Ha! Fooled ya! Those were all said by the 45thpresident—a MAGA Republican—between 2016 and 2020. And you know what? I suggest we listen to him. That'll teach that evil, document-stealing 45th president to mess around with the no-nonsense, justice-dispensing 45th president.
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Ten years ago in C&J: September 6, 2013
CHEERS to boldly going where no one has gone before (well, if you don't count the invisible pod people colonizing in Louie Gohmert's head). The spacecraft Voyager 1, which was launched 36 years ago, is breaking up with us and leaving us for another solar system:
The plutonium-powered probe is more than 11 1/2 billion miles from the sun, cruising through what scientists call interstellar space — the vast, cold emptiness between the stars, the space agency said.
Voyager 1 actually made its exit more than a year ago, according to NASA. But it’s not as if there’s a dotted boundary line out there or a signpost, and it was not until recently that the space agency had the evidence to convince it of what an outside research team had claimed last month: that the spacecraft had finally plowed through the hot plasma bubble surrounding the planets and escaped the sun’s influence.
The split is amicable: we get to keep the photo album and it gets to keep the 8-track player.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to U.S. Mint'y freshness. The new American Women Quarter is here! The new American Women Quarter is here! Yes indeed, the latest in the series of U.S. quarters celebrating accomplished American women was released earlier this month, and this one comes to you from Texas starrrrrrrrrrring…..Jovita Idar!
Jovita Idar was a Mexican-American journalist, activist, teacher, and suffragist.
She made it her mission to pursue civil rights for Mexican Americans and believed education was the foundation for a better future. Idar wrote many news articles in various publications, speaking out about racism and supporting the revolution in Mexico. Throughout her life, Idar remained on the front lines of change and advocated fiercely for the rights of women and Mexican Americans.
The quarter depicts Jovita Idar with her hands clasped. Within her body are inscriptions representing some of her greatest accomplishments and the newspapers for which she wrote.
The quarter is now in wide release everywhere but Texas. They’re still working on Governor Abbott’s mandate that each one be individually wrapped in razor wire.
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
"Why am I not surprised that Neal Katyal made it a priority to get to a neopagan ritual? Pray that these folks come to the light and realize that the only path is through and to the Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool. We are all fallen and need Bill in Portland Maine, and to repent as a Nation."
—Jeff Clark
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