7/31/2017

Trump Did Shake That Disabled Kid's Hand But Was a Dick in Every Other Way

You gotta watch yourself these days. When I first saw the footage of Donald Trump seeming to ignore the proffered hand of little Monty Weer, in a wheelchair because he suffers from spina bifida, I was ready to jump. It seemed perfectly in character for Trump to simply not to have wanted to turn his gaze downward to see the 3-year-old reaching up. It seemed exactly like the actions of the germophobic asshole who desires nothing more than to take health insurance away from millions of Americans. It turns out that prior to the piece of video that had gone viral, Trump had not only shaken Monty's hand, he leaned down and talked to him. Actually, it was a kind of sweet moment. Even persimmon-shaded goblins can be kind every once in a while.

And I'm not gonna say that I "had a feeling" the edited video wasn't true or any such shit. I just thought, "Christ, I can't keep up. Let this one go" and held back from tweeting or committing an act of bloggery.

Many people didn't, and they leapt before they looked, including author JK Rowling, who has been inspirationally acerbic in her attacks on Trump. After mass browbeating and outrage and a screaming Piers Morgan banshee attacking her, Rowling has apologized.

But let's not give Trump a happy handy just because he was nice to a boy in a wheelchair. Because, see, that boy and his family were in the White House last week to be props in his attack on the Affordable Care Act. The Weers and others were presented as "Obamacare's victims," and they were supposed to sway Americans into turning against a law that has objectively saved lives.

In fact, you could say that the primary reason that Monty Weer was even there, as in "alive," was because of the Affordable Care Act. His story is, of course, more complicated than the way that Trump made it seem. Obamacare didn't enter Monty's room like the Babadook to torment him. What the Affordable Care Act did do are a few things that even his mother admitted are immensely helpful. Marjorie Weer knows that the ACA's ban on insurance policies having lifetime benefit caps and discriminating against people with pre-existing conditions has worked to keep Monty alive and taken care of.

What frustrates her is that only one insurer is currently available in her state and that she has had to switch insurance or look for new doctors for Monty and the rest of her family. "The doctors that we were able to see this year, I don’t know if I’m going to see them next year. And our monthly premiums have increased by 23 percent," she said in an interview yesterday. And that is a situation that has to compound the difficulty in taking care of Monty. But rather than blame, as she does, "congressmen and women who have no business, probably, messing with the health care system" (for, indeed, if Democrats hadn't "messed with" it, Monty would not even have insurance), perhaps she should turn some of her ire to those who have screwed up the Affordable Care Act.

The Weers live in South Carolina, which not only didn't set up state exchanges, it has refused to expand Medicaid. In fact, the vast majority of counties with one or even no insurers are in states that have been as dickish as South Carolina. Two other states, Alaska and Arizona, accepted the Medicaid expansion, but didn't set up state exchanges. Only Iowa did both and still faces an uncertain market. So, yeah, there's a fuckin' pattern.

The design of the Affordable Care Act was dependent on states actually giving two fucks about their residents, but if you're trapped in a GOP-controlled pro-death-and-disease state, you have to deal with this bullshit. And if you give any support to President Trump, then you agree with his attempts to undermine insurance companies by threatening to withhold cost-sharing reduction payments. Essentially, that means "not paying your bills" (and it ain't a "bailout," as Trump likes to lie and say), which has helped drive insurers away from less profitable markets.

But let's be completely honest here. There might only be one insurer, Blue Cross Blue Shield, in South Carolina, but it's offering 24 different plans at different price ranges. It's not one plan or nothing.

And let's be even honester: Single payer would eliminate all of these issues.

Marjorie Weer and her family deserve all our sympathy and support, even if they're confused about how the ACA works. They deserve better than to be made into caricatures that our criminal dope of a president can point to and demand cruel retribution. And whether they realize it fully or not, the Affordable Care Act allowed Monty to be there, to greet the criminal dope, to have a video go viral.

Yeah, lots of liberals got it wrong about the handshake. But we got it right that Trump really doesn't give a damn if Monty Weer lives or dies.

7/28/2017

Observations on a Late-Night Rescue Mission

1. Let's appreciate people in the proper order here for last night's stake in the heart of Trumpcare, the current effort at repealing the Affordable Care Act (and, like a movie monster, it will be back, no doubt, for another goddamn sequel):

a. Voters from across the nation inundated legislators with calls and messages and face-to-face confrontations. Some of the most effective opposition came from disabled Americans who blocked hallways and demanded to be heard by their senators. They were stark and real physical reminders of what's at stake if the Affordable Care Act was repealed. People in wheelchairs and on ventilators were abused and arrested, but they bravely persisted.

b. Democrats held together in a way that I have rarely seen. While you can attribute that to solid leadership, you can also say it was helped by the support of their constituents (and the fact that GOP efforts polled at less than 20% support). The strongest outcome from this politically is that finally, at long last, Democrats have decided to own Obamacare fully. Sure, sure, Chuck Schumer spoke of the need to improve it (perhaps putting on too much of a show of eating shit). But Democrats have staked their electoral futures on the turn in public opinion in favor of the ACA, and that just might reveal a path to the real improvement: single payer.

c. Early on, I predicted that Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski (and, perhaps, John McCain) had the potential to turn independent and maybe caucus with the Democrats. While that didn't happen, these two senators, from far flung states, stood firm against every effort to cut Medicaid, undermine the insurance exchanges, and get rid of policies that protected the most vulnerable in people in Maine and Alaska. Both of them withstood insane pressure and even wishes for violence against them from the savage members of their party in the House. Hell, Murkowski even had her state directly threatened by the Secretary of the Interior. In the end, they told their party's leadership, including the idiot president, to go fuck themselves. That was gutsy and even honorable, something you can rarely say about Republicans.

d. And, finally, John McCain did something vaguely mavericky in voting against the skinny repeal. That's great, but remember that he only did it because his sense of Senate protocol was too offended by the process. If he was against the repeal in general (or even the process), he could have stopped it on Monday by voting against the motion to proceed to debate. And he opposed this bill because it didn't do enough to get rid of the ACA. This is not to mention that he's weak and sick and needs to get back to Arizona for treatment but wanted to get to the next bill, the National Defense Authorization Act, before leaving. Bombs before chemo. But, fine, let's give him some props for a few minutes. Besides, there's also a good chance McCain did this as a solid "Go fuck yourself" to Donald Trump for shitting on McCain's military service during the campaign.

2. What comes next is up in the air. Trump is probably going to demand that Congress not pay insurance companies the cost-sharing reductions subsidies they are supposed to get under the ACA. McConnell already started calling those promised payments "bailing out" insurers, which is like telling your credit card company that your monthly payment to them is "charity." Schumer thinks everyone might just get along for a bit. But the mad, mad House of Representatives is already wanting to tee up another repeal because otherwise they'd have to govern.

3. Except for a few true believers, like the skeevy cat fucker Rand Paul or the sleazy cat strangler Ted Cruz, you know that most Republicans were thinking, "Oh, thank fucking god" last night. If the repeal had passed, the millions kicked off insurance and the skyrocketing premiums and the closure of Planned Parenthood clinics and the cut in the budget to the CDC (yeah, that was in there) and the end of the employer mandate, all the fuckery contained in a simple eight pages, would have been theirs. It's a helluva lot easier to bitch about something than to have to fix it.

3a. Democrats had better be ready to take down Jeff Flake and Dean Heller, both "yes" votes in states that aren't solidly Republican, in 2018.

4. Mitch McConnell's very real anguish was delicious.

7/26/2017

How Much Degradation Can We Stand?: The Most Embarrassing Things Trump Said in Three Speeches

President Donald Trump, a man who wouldn't know honor if it bit his ass and screamed, "I'm honor," gave a speech to the annual Boy Scout Jamboree. During it, he unzipped his fly and pulled out his little dick, stretched it until it was near ripping and said, "Check out that dick, boys. Not bad. Not bad, if I say so myself. And you know I do." When he wasn't shaking his dick at the children, he was making jokes like he was starring in Hell's version of Catch a Rising Star, riffing and then stepping away from the microphone and swinging his Yeti-like arms for emphasis. It was like watching a brain-damaged ape trying to imitate Rodney Dangerfield.

The next night, last night, Trump had another one of his Nuremberg Rallies (yeah, I'm comparing him to Hitler - Do we have to wait until he's gassing people to do that?), this time in Ohio. An asshole in defeat, he is a throbbing, distended sphincter in victory. So he dropped his pants in front of the gathered 6000 people and said, "I'm gonna make Democrats and Jeff Sessions and Lisa Murkowski kiss my fat ass!"

Well, not really. But it was two days of utter degradation, an embarrassing display put on by our goddamned president. You've heard some of the shitty things he said, but, believe me (as he would say), there was line after line of shame and shamelessness and dickishness and brazen fuckery. For instance,

At the Boy Scout Jamboree:

- "I am thrilled to be here. Thrilled. And if you think that was an easy trip, you’re wrong." Trump is acting like he personally hiked through the mountains of West Virginia to get to the event when he was brought there on a golden throne. Probably there was no golf cart go from the holding area to the stage. But he wants the kids to be grateful he made the effort.

- "By the way, what do you think the chances are that this incredible, massive crowd, record-setting is going to be shown on television tonight? One percent or zero?" Trump is obsessed with setting records. He could just become a professional hot dog eater and call up Guinness, but, no, he's gotta fuck with all of us.

- "I saw him at a cocktail party, and it was very sad because the hottest people in New York were at this party." In the midst of a rambling tale about William Leavitt, Trump dropped in that he went to a cocktail party with the "hottest people." Because of course he did. Because why would he waste his time with less than the hottest? Because what the fuck else would you tell a bunch of children and teenagers eager to race wooden block cars? A story about camping? He'd've had to have fucking camped to do that.

- "Do you remember that incredible night with the maps and the Republicans are red and the Democrats are blue, and that map was so red, it was unbelievable, and they didn't know what to say?" He told the Scouts about his election victory. Because of course he did. He also shit on Hillary Clinton. Because of course he did.

- "By the way, under the Trump administration, you’ll be saying, Merry Christmas again when you go shopping. Believe me. Merry Christmas. They've been downplaying that little, beautiful phrase. You're going to be saying, merry Christmas again, folks." It's fucking July. It's. Fucking. July. Anyone saying, "Merry Christmas" now is a fucking loser.

And then at his speech "Saluting American Heroes" in Ohio:

- "It's great to be back in Youngstown. It was an incredible time we had. And you know the numbers, and you saw for many, many years Democrats -- and they're really great -- but Democrats, they win in Youngstown. But not this time." Election victory. Because of course.

And then at his rally in Youngstown later:

- "Boy, he's a young one. He's going back home to mommy. Oh, is he in trouble. He's in trouble. He's in trouble. And I'll bet his mommy voted for us, right?" This was a reaction to a protester, bullying him and deriding him for doing what Trump did for years on Twitter when Obama was president.

- "We're gonna have it so that Americans can once again speak the magnificent words of Alexander Hamilton, 'Here the people govern.'" This was weirdly sandwiched between his proclamation that he was going to bring back factory jobs and his assertion that only the "late, great" Lincoln was more presidential than him. As usual, Trump gets history wrong. Hamilton was talking about Congress, especially that Congress was a check on the power of the presidency. In other words, "Here, sir, the people govern: Here they act by their immediate representatives" is a direct rebuke to Trump's desire to run roughshod over Congress.

- "So they'll take a young, beautiful girl, 16, 15, and others and they slice them and dice them with a knife because they want them to go through excruciating pain before they die. And these are the animals that we've been protecting for so long." This was shortly after Trump praised police brutality towards people arrested as gang members. It's fearmongering in its purest, most sinister form, a kind of propaganda that will get people worked up.

- "We will buy American and will hire, finally, American." Trump's own businesses are seeking visas to hire foreign workers. So, you know, fuck that lie.

At each of these occasions, the crowds, even most of the Scouts, cheered and chanted wildly.

This vertiginous ride we're on has gotten sickening. Trump has degraded the language, the laws, the nation, and us, all of us. How far into the dirt will he drag us before we finally either give up or fight back?

7/25/2017

Fuck You, John McCain

(Note: I took this down for a couple of days because I said I would if John McCain voted down the worthless skinny repeal. He did and I did and now I'm putting it back up because there are many reasons to say, "Fuck you" to McCain. Not the least of those reasons is that he gave the Nero-like thumbs down to the skinny repeal in part because it wasn't cruel enough in taking health care away from millions. So, yeah, a few things are wrong, but the feelings are right.)

I know there are people who are more responsible than Arizona Senator John McCain for the passage of the motion to proceed to dismantle health care coverage for millions of Americans and give a big ass tax cut to the wealthiest in the country. I know that there is still a long, long way to go before any actual legislation that does all that passes, although it really just seems like a fait accompli at this point. And I know, I know, Christ, fuck, I know that in some cosmic sense it's wrong to attack someone who has an aggressive form of brain cancer and just had a blood clot removed from behind his eyeball, that such suffering ought to be given respect. But fuck all that.

Fuck you, John McCain, you petulant, pissant son of a bitch. Fuck you, fuck your legacy, fuck your pain, fuck your recovery, fuck your family, and fuck, fuck, fuck you. And I feel free to say that because, with his vote today to allow debate on some bullshit new health care plan, he said, "Fuck you" to hundreds of thousands of his state's constituents who will lose Medicaid coverage or be priced out of insurance or be pushed into some worthless policy.

The saddest response to McCain's announcement yesterday that he was returning early to Washington to vote on the motion-to-proceed was the hope that the mythical maverick McCain would show up and, likely having no more elections to run, would do the right thing by voting "No." That McCain never existed, and, except for issues like torture, he has been as loyal a Republican as any flea on the hairs on Mitch McConnell's waxy balls. Of course he was coming back to dick people over. It's what he does. He's a motherfucker, like every other Republican motherfucker. Motherfuckers fuck mothers. How many times do I have to say this? They fuck mothers. It's right there in the word. If they get a chance to fuck a mother, they will fuck that mother because they are motherfuckers. And the repeal of the Affordable Care Act is like a sticky blood orgy of motherfuckery. By the time the process is over, Republicans will fuck every hole and carve some new ones to fuck.

Not only did McCain vote, but then he saw fit to stand there and give a sanctimonious goddamned speech decrying how the Senate has become "more partisan, more tribal." He called for a return to some kind of era of comity, and he blamed both parties for what he sees as a breakdown in "regular order" in the Senate and the ability to work together. And all over the media, people acted like fuckin' Lancelot had just come riding in to save the day when it was really just a filthy one-eyed poodle with a chip on its shoulder and ankles to bite.

Let's contextualize: "Regular order" was stabbed to death by Republicans during the Obama presidency when the Senate GOP decided that every bill would be filibustered when they were in the minority and any idea of the President's would be blocked when they got the majority. John McCain barely squeaked a single fart of protest out from between his saggy ass cheeks. In fact, again, except for torture (sometimes), he went along every single fucked up time that Republicans threw themselves in the way of legislation passed by the House. And then he blew shit up like a common terrorist when Republicans got the Senate back. "Regular order," motherfucker? Suck a pig dick.

Shit, in his little vomit of a speech today, he smirked when he criticized Democrats for not engaging Republicans on the Affordable Care Act: "The Obama administration and congressional Democrats shouldn’t have forced through Congress without any opposition support a social and economic change as massive as Obamacare." Bitch, there were ten months of hearings and 160 Republican amendments got into the bill. So make a dildo out of your complaint about regular order and shove it up your worn out sphincter.

And let's contextualize further: What McCain voted for today was a phantom bill. It was a sham to get something out there so that the amendment process could start on the House bill. It was as far from regular order as having monkeys fuck on the floor of the Senate, although that's a fair analogy for what actually occurred.

The final fucking insult from McCain today was that he once again pretended like he might be a maverick. He said, "Why don’t we try the old way of legislating in the Senate, the way our rules and customs encourage us to act. If this process ends in failure, which seem likely, then let’s return to regular order." If you think that McCain will do anything noble, if you think he will put country over party or compassion over ideology, then you have no idea who John McCain really is: a shitty human being who tricked everyone into thinking he was better than that, a false idol, and a sad, miserable fool who deserves to be pissed on by everyone he passes. He had a chance to be a hero to the vast majority of Americans today, but he didn't care. Not even after receiving the government-paid health care he has gotten his entire life. And he gives a win to Donald Trump, who mocked McCain being a POW during the Vietnam War.

Fuck him.

Besides, he gave us Sarah Palin, whose stupidity, vapidity, and cruelty arguably paved over the gravel road and made the ride easier for Donald Trump.

So fuck him forever.

7/24/2017

Another Big Republican Lie on the ACA: They Can Give You Something Better

We know that Republicans have lied nonstop about the Affordable Care Act ever since it was passed into law by a Democratic-led Congress and signed by the Negro President. We know that Republicans are stuck because Obamacare is mostly based on Massachusetts's Romneycare and both come from plans from the conservative Heritage Foundation. We know that Republicans lied and continue to lie about the effects of the AHCA and then the BCRA, the House and Senate versions of their "repeal and replace" bills. But there is one more thing, one more set of lies, that is responsible for sticking a shiv into the GOP's dream of murdering a bunch of poor people so rich people can be richer.

See, Republicans keep trying to put the blame for the fix they're in on American voters. "We have to keep our promises to the American people," Republicans say. "We won the last three elections by promising to repeal and replace Obamacare," they whine like a dog that caught a cat only to realize it was a fucking mountain lion. Yeah, they're right. Voters did put Republicans in power over the promise of getting rid of the Obamacare horror and torture or whatever drama queen word you wanna use. But, and this is important, they only wanted to get rid of it because Republicans said they'd do better. Or, to put it another way, they lied about what they could do for people if the Affordable Care Act was overturned.

Senator after senator told you how you were enslaved by Obamacare and that the GOP would set you free. John McCain proclaimed, "Families in Arizona and across the country should have the power to make their own medical decisions – not Washington bureaucrats. This bill puts patients and doctors back in charge of their health care by fully repealing Obamacare and replacing it with a free-market approach that strengthens the quality and accessibility of care." John Thune promised, "It’s time to repeal this law and replace it with something that works. And that’s precisely what we’re going to do."

Others got even more explicit. For instance, here's Wyoming Senator John Barrasso (campaign slogan: "If you can't trust a man whose name includes the phrase 'bare ass,' who can you trust?"), from a speech he gave on the floor of the Senate in November, shortly after the election: "First of all, nobody is talking about taking people off of insurance without a replacement plan in place." Except that's exactly what they talked about. While Republicans will constantly mention how President Obama said, "If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor" (which, to be fair, was an absurd promise), they simply aren't owning that they got voters all excited about this new fantasy health care plan where they wouldn't lose coverage despite repealing the very law that gave them coverage.

In fact, when you get to what President Donald Trump said, Republicans were promising something amazing. Put aside that Trump repeatedly said he wouldn't cut Medicaid and then, immediately after inauguration, put out a plan to cut Medicaid. Trump and his people consistently promised that Americans would have better health insurance coverage, that all Americans would be covered, and that it would cost them less in premiums and deductibles. He literally said this: "You will end up with great health care for a fraction of the price." And he told Americans that we would have a "beautiful picture" in the future of health care.

Republicans like to say that Democrats promise that they'll give people "free stuff" and that people on government programs like Medicaid are "moochers." But Republicans didn't win on the Obamacare issue because people didn't want free stuff. They didn't win because they said they would take away their health insurance. They won because they promised people more free stuff and better free stuff.

In other words, they lied. But voters believed them. They wanted to mooch more.

And the vast majority of Americans realize now that it was a lie because the Trumpcare plan that the Senate may vote to move forward tomorrow does none of the things they promised other than get rid of the health insurance they have now or make it worse and more expensive. So, of course, now we get articles like "These Americans Hated the Health Law. Until the Idea of Repeal Sank In." In that New York Times piece, Pennsylvania dumb shits who once thought Obamacare was the worst thing since the theory of evolution say things like "I can’t even remember why I opposed it" and "Everybody needs some sort of health insurance." One stupid fuck went from opposing the law to "Now that you’ve insured an additional 20 million people, you can’t just take the insurance away from these people. It’s just not the right thing to do."

But we knew all along that people liked the Affordable Care Act. They liked the elimination of spending caps and of pre-existing conditions determining premiums. They liked keeping their kids on insurance until age 26. And a shit-ton of people got to live because of the Medicaid expansion. Yeah, the ACA was fine. What they hated was Obamacare, which is exactly what Republicans wanted people to think of for a very simple reason:

Most Republican voters don't hate the ACA. They hate that their white asses were saved by a black man.

They resented the shit out of that fact. It put a lie to all the racism they've clung to for generations. The GOP used that racism for years. Now that the black man is gone, though, they're totally fine with the law and its benefits. They gave Republicans a chance to give them more stuff, but they don't want their stuff taken away. Especially when that "stuff" is the right to live a healthy life.

Be careful this week, dear dumb shits and dearer smart asses. Republicans are going to keep coming after the Affordable Care Act, no matter how many shivs you stick in it. Stay on the phones. Keep the pressure up on the few Republican senators who can make the difference. Don't let the liars win. It's life and death, motherfuckers, life and death.

And once we finally put this beast down, let's turn our attention to single payer.

(Fun extra part of Barrasso's speech: "Democrats promised that they would listen to other people’s ideas, and then they went behind a closed door in an office back there, and they wrote the law ignoring all of the suggestions by Republicans, and without any Republican support at all. We’re not going to make that same mistake. We will be looking for Democrats’ help, we will be looking for Democrats to work with. We will be listening to Democrats’ ideas, and we will be working very hard to win Democrat votes for any new law." Insert your own rolling-with-laughter emoji here.)

7/20/2017

Bonfire of the Inanities: Observations on Trump's Interview With the New York Times

At this point, any new batshit thing that President Donald Trump says comes across less as a shock and more like another punch to the face in a boxing match. If you're an experienced fighter, you know exactly how it's gonna feel when that glove pounds your chin, but, goddamnit, it still hurts and, goddamnit, you want it to stop. So this latest New York Times "interview" (if by "interview," you mean, "a lunatic scrawling in shit on his rubber room walls") with Trump is the usual serving of blithering, dithering, and withering, all tossed into a word salad that sounds like it might be English but is a colloquial bowl of chopped ideas that we could call "Trumpese."

The usual things that crop up any time Trump speaks were in full effect here:

1. Self-fellatio - Trump praises himself endlessly for doing the most, having the most, being the most, even if it's a goddamned lie. Here he is on his speech in Poland: "Enemies of mine in the media, enemies of mine are saying it was the greatest speech ever made on foreign soil by a president...You saw the reviews I got on that speech." Or on the rollback of Obama-era regulations: " I’ve given the farmers back their farms. I’ve given the builders back their land to build houses and to build other things." Can you imagine the hategasm that would splooge all over the airwaves if President Obama had said, "I gave people health insurance"? We'd be cleaning up that goo for years. But Trump's voters love that he acts like he's the king. They want a king. They want to be ruled. They want discipline. Shit, basically, he's their Dom and they're his loyal Subs, except the rest of us have been dragged into it without a safe word or, you know, consent.

2. Shitting on others - Yeah, Trump just sprayed scat all over Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the Justice Department in general. In addition to questioning the motives of Robert Mueller (as well as threatening to fire him) and bizarrely saying that Sessions shouldn't have taken the job if he was going to recuse himself from Russia matters (remember: Sessions tried not to do so until it was revealed he lied under oath about his meetings), Trump says of his firing of James Comey, "I think I did a great thing for the American people." The American people just want someone who'll do the goddamn job. It's mighty strange, by the way, to say that you did nothing wrong but wanting the investigation shut down.

2a. Shitting on Hillary Clinton - Because of course he did.

3. Cornered rat babbling - Asked about the conversation with Vladimir Putin that wasn't reported until well after the G20 summit, Trump was like a tween caught with weed in his dresser. He wove an elaborate tale about how the chat came to be, setting the scene at the dinner all the leaders attended, who was seated where, who was talking to whom, who else might have been there, the fucking opera they watched. Then Trump said what he and Putin discussed: "Actually, it was very interesting, we talked about adoption." The fuck? (I wish Maggie Haberman had said that instead of "You did?") Trump continued, "We talked about Russian adoption. Yeah. I always found that interesting. Because, you know, he ended that years ago. And I actually talked about Russian adoption with him, which is interesting because it was a part of the conversation that Don [Jr.] had in that meeting." That means they talked about the lifting of the sanctions in the Magnitsky Act, which is pretty fucking important. But a cornered rat will do that. Amid the lies and distractions, they will squeak out some truth.

4. Paranoid ranting - Everyone is out to get Trump, according to Trump. The news media, of course, but, more significantly, Barack Obama creeps into his head and he can't help but go nutzoid insulting his beloved White House predecessor. "Don’t forget, Crimea was given away during Obama. Not during Trump," he said, speaking of himself in the third person, which is so disconcerting. He then went incoherent until he got back to Obama: "In fact, I was on one of the shows, I said they’re exactly right, they didn’t have it as it exactly. But he was — this — Crimea was gone during the Obama administration, and he gave, he allowed it to get away. You know, he can talk tough all he wants, in the meantime he talked tough to North Korea. And he didn’t actually. He didn’t talk tough to North Korea. You know, we have a big problem with North Korea. Big. Big, big." Jesus, calm down there, big fella. "You look at all of the things, you look at the line in the sand. The red line in the sand in Syria. He didn’t do the shot. I did the shot. Had he done that shot, he wouldn’t have had — had he done something dramatic, because if you remember, they had a tremendous gas attack after he made that statement. Much bigger than the one they had with me." Ah, finally he can let Obama win one: Syria gassed more people under Obama than under Trump. Such a humble man, our president.

5. Just weird shit - Every interview with Trump is guaranteed to have some bizarre notes, those moments when Trump sounds like a Hollywood producer in the 1970s. You could go with his description of the Bastille Day parade in Paris ("You know what else that was nice? It was limited. You know, it was two hours, and the parade ended. It didn’t go a whole day") or even when he jumped subjects like a weasel on meth ("The Russians have great fighters in the cold. They use the cold to their advantage. I mean, they’ve won five wars where the armies that went against them froze to death. It’s pretty amazing. So, we’re having a good time. The economy is doing great.") But I'm gonna go with the saga of French President Macron and his love of holding Trump's hand: "He’s a great guy. Smart. Strong. Loves holding my hand...People don’t realize he loves holding my hand. And that’s good, as far as that goes...I think he is going to be a terrific president of France. But he does love holding my hand." Every night, Macron touches the hand that held Trump's, and a single tear runs slowly down his face as he remembers those soft, small fingers interlaced with his.

Keep in mind that these were easy questions because the reporters know that if you ask Trump something about policy, like "Can you explain a single fucking thing about how the ACA exchanges work?" or if you challenge him, like "Why did you lie about Medicaid cuts?" he'll just shut down like an overstimulated toddler. Even on the softball questions, he got basic facts wrong and he didn't know when to shut the fuck up. Sure, Trump ought to be interviewed like anyone would Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama or, fuck, Mitt Romney, but we all know that he's fucking stupid so get the stupid people to talk about the one thing they feel comfortable with: themselves.

It's not shocking anymore. And we need to be careful about that. The thing about a boxing match is that the fighters can never let it get boring and rote. It might be exhausting or excruciating. But you gotta stay in the moments or you'll find yourself flat on your ass, without health care, with your country at war, with your voting rights gone, and with your environment collapsing.

7/17/2017

Trump Voters Were Wrong, So Fuck Their Opinions

In just six short months, it's become absolutely clear: Everyone who didn't vote for Donald Trump was right and everyone who voted for him was wrong. Yeah, yeah, they weren't wrong in that Trump won the election, just as someone isn't wrong for supporting a shitty baseball team. But it's incredibly clear now that the poor suckers and greedy fuckers who wanted to nuzzle up to Trump's man-teats for a suckle were wrong on just about every account regarding who he is and what he'd do.

They were wrong that he's a man of his word, they were wrong that he would look out for working people, they were wrong that he would make the nation respected "again" (as if it wasn't before), they were wrong that he wouldn't have scandals, and they were just wrong about him being a human being worthy of the office. They were wrong and we who voted against him (and I'm tossing anyone who voted for Hillary Clinton, Jill Stein, Gary Johnson, and Deez Nutz into the category of "voted against him") were right.

Trump voters fucked the goat, and so everything they say should be framed within the fact that they are goatfuckers. "Oh, you have an opinion on health care? Sorry, you fucked a goat. I don't give a shit about your goat-fucking opinion," we should think. But that's not what we do. We don't shun the goatfuckers, no matter how savagely they fucked that goat. We see that most clearly by the fact that the news networks and other media outlets still entertain the opinions of people who supported the Iraq war and never said they were wrong about it. Goatfuckers get away with it.

So we're treated on an almost daily basis to articles and stories about Trump voters and what they think about some issue and whether or not Trump's evil, batshit incompetence is enough for them to bail on the Orange King. Every single one of these stories is the same: Here are some assholes who voted for Trump. Let's treat them with reverence, as if they have hard-won wisdom because they shovel shit or work at Wal-Mart. Let's tell them about all the fuckery that Donald Trump has been up to and see what they think. Oh, look, they don't give a shit because he still hates the Mooslems and Messicans. And what might change their minds about Trumpochet? "I don’t know what he would have to do...I guess maybe kill someone. Just in cold blood."

That's an actual quote from an actual person in a Tennesseean article on Wayne County, Tennessee, an almost entirely white rural area with less people than my neighborhood. The thrust of the piece is that Trump voters couldn't give a happy monkey fuck about the Russia scandal. In fact, they think Trump is being maligned and Don, Jr. is awesome. This is the newest wrinkle in the genre: What do stupid people think about something they don't understand at all? In the last week, Vox has done a story on Michigan Trump voters, who don't think the Russian connections are any big deal. The BBC sent a reporter to the Nebraska State Fair to get some American color (yes, ironic, I know) and some video of deluded shitheels sharing their delusions.

As Newsweek's Alexander Nazaryn wrote, "The real story here is how thoroughly Trump supporters have been deceived, both by Trump and tireless boot-lickers like Hannity and Jones. Every quote from an Ohioan who declares the Russia investigation is irrelevant is a testament to the delusive brand of Republicanism that now reigns supreme." Joshua Green said much the same in the New York Times.

Each of the Trump voter pieces generally has a token interview with someone who doesn't support Trump. But they are presented as curiosities, the two-headed cow that shouldn't exist but somehow does. But the reality is, obviously, people who think Trump is full of shit vastly outnumber the aforementioned suckers and fuckers who stand by their man. How about interviewing some of us? How about asking us, "How did you know?" And we can say, "Anyone with a fuckin' brain knew." Ask us, "What do you think about the Russia dealie?" And we can say, "Either we do something about it or we're fucked."

Hell, you don't even have to stick to the cities, where the majority of the country lives. Since you've got a rural jones, you can head to Bolivar, Tennessee, a town in the ass-crack of nowhere, near to the Alabama border, as Deep South as you can get. They went for Hillary Clinton, as did nearby Whiteville. Of course, those are majority African American towns, so you'd have to change the whole goddamned narrative away from the mighty white working class.

Or, here's an idea, why not go to the communities that went for Trump and find the people who didn't. Talk to them. See if they're feeling smug or sad or angry. See what their ideas are for getting us out of this or through this goddamn bullshit time. Find out how they're feeling about Trump's relationship with Russia. Ask them because they, like the majority of the country, were right.

Let's spend a little time and energy, dear, sweet reporters, on people who aren't barking mad or madly barking.

(Note: If you didn't vote at all, go suck a donkey's dick.)

(Note: If you wanna write to me about "goatfucker shaming," I hate you already. Same for "donkey-dick sucker shaming." Some things are just fucking shameful. Sucking a donkey's dick, fucking a goat, and voting for Donald Trump, for examples.)

7/13/2017

Republicans Really Want You to Die Faster

In case you were wondering just how cruel and crazy Republicans can be, here's a little example:

Rep. Steve King, who looks like the kind of ghoul who eats the spleens of children and then makes a coat of their skins, was asked on CNN about funding for the bullshit wall with Mexico (that's now supposedly going to be covered in solar panels and transparent, which is a contradiction, but, fuck, that's our president). The Iowa Republican had a savage answer: "I’d throw another $5 billion on the pile, and I would find a half of a billion dollars of that right out of Planned Parenthood’s budget, and the rest of it could come out of food stamps and the entitlements that are being spread out for people that haven’t worked in three generations."

That's right. King wants to take money away from health care for women and food out of the mouths of families to fulfill a complete fucking lie. All those people losing food stamps will be fine because "we will create the kind the security that would bring about 10 million new jobs in America just by enforcing immigration law." That's as much of a fantasy as unicorns and trickle-down economics.

And if you're thinking, "Wow, this is fucked up. That dude is fucked up. But I need some genuine awful stupidity to complete the rage I need to put my fist through my computer screen." Oh, dear, dear reader, of course there is some stupid here.

See, Steve King, who looks like he keeps donkey fucking photos on his phone to show his colleagues and laugh at their reactions, says that because food stamps "solved" the hunger crisis in this country, it has led to greater rates of obesity. Not the high fructose corn syrup from, you know, Iowa, or the fact that shitty food is cheaper than healthy food. No, the government has been too generous and made people fat. "We built a program to solve the problem of malnutrition in America," King blathered, "and now we have a problem of obesity."

And if you're thinking, "Yeah, that's so fucking dumb it's a wonder that Steve King can breathe and walk at the same time. But I need this to somehow be tied to the Obamas for it to tip me into a murder spree that I shouldn't be held accountable for." Oh, dear, psychopathic reader, you don't know Steve King, whose voice has the flat tone you hear above you when you wake up in a basement pit.

For, indeed, he did tie the issue to the former First Lady in saying that his cuts to food stamps won't be so bad: "I wouldn’t impose anything more strict on anybody in America than what Michelle Obama did with her school lunch program."

And there it is, the pinnacle of Republicanism, an example that serves to demonstrate everything wrong with the bugfuck insane and tragically, willfully, proudly ignorant conservatives. Michelle Obama wanted to help with growing rates of childhood obesity by getting kids to eat healthier and exercise and for schools to offer better choices than Pepsi and lard. So, obviously, its real goal was to starve Americans while food stamps made them fatter. Or something. Logic doesn't matter. Facts don't matter. Humane behavior doesn't matter. Nothing matters except that government is evil and the Obamas are the evillest.

Why spend so much time on someone who ought to be busy convincing people to buy time shares while yelling at his grandkids about the "coloreds"? Because King's brand of dumb cruelty is the same as the driving force behind the revised Republican health care bill in the Senate, which manages to be crueler and dumber than the House version. The putrid Ted Cruz's putrid amendment would stick a meat hook into the Affordable Care Act's insurance guarantees and rip them open until their guts are steaming on the ground while Cruz yowls as he jacks off into the gore. The Medicaid cuts are essentially Mitch McConnell saying, "Fuck you" to the so-called moderate senators, daring them to defy him, the party, and Trump, in that order, daring them to stare into his dead amphibian eyes and have their souls sucked away.

Republicans are saying, in word and action, that they hold their constituents in contempt. The voters are disposable. In fact, they are saying, let's help them along, whether by starving them or taking away their health care. And then let's make them thank us because, we can say, we kept our promises.

Goddamnit, they will, too.

7/11/2017

Unlike Most of the GOP, the Trumps Are Shitty Liars

Let's be clear here: The Republican Party holds the power it does because it is unafraid to lie. From the overhyped fear of Communism to the overhyped fear of crime to the overhyped fear of terrorism, the GOP has jumped from lie to lie to lie in order to maintain power, often pivoting back to ones that work so well, like welfare fraud and, time and again, crime. They recovered from their near dismantling in 2006 and 2008, after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 washed away the Bush bullshit, by going big with the lies about Barack Obama and, especially, about the Affordable Care Act. And as Republican leaders in the Senate desperately try to come up with a way to squeeze out one more turd of a Trumpcare bill, they are lying with abandon, and not just about what's in the aforementioned turd.

Obamacare markets aren't "collapsing." They're stabilizing. People on the Medicaid expansion aren't desperate to get rid of it. They are satisfied with the care they are getting. Over two-thirds of the country, including a majority of Republicans, support the birth control mandate in Obamacare, the subject of another fake controversy just to appeal to yahoo religious nutzoids.

And the reason that they've gotten away with lying is that they are so fucking good at it. They are so fucking good at playing the media, playing their constituents, playing the Democrats, playing everyone. They are master bullshitters. They get away with it because conservative ideas in a political context are so fucking simple to understand. What's easier on the brain? "We should provide decent education, housing, job-training, and anti-poverty programs to help combat crime"? Or "Lock 'em up"? Democrats can't compete until they come up with a better story than the lies that have worked so well for so long.

It was going along so well for the GOP until the Trumps, this family of outsiders, came along and fucked it all up. Donald Trump, Jared Kushner, and Junior have lived on a privileged plane of existence, where having a cadre of brutish dickhead attorneys on retainer is enough of a deterrent for anyone who would dare question them or try to get paid fairly. They could intimidate people into silence or, if that fails, settle any lawsuits with the handy provisions that they admit no guilt and the plaintiffs can't talk about it. They could be bumblefuck corrupt business shitheels and get away with it.

The biggest problem in getting into the public arena is that, all of a sudden, the Trumps have to deal with the federal government, an entity that doesn't just have lawyers but entire goddamned bureaus devoted to investigating just the kind of fuckery that the Trumps have regularly been involved in. Throw in a media that realizes it had better make itself relevant again or just fucking give up, and a group of people as boisterously, unashamedly moronic as the Trumps don't stand a chance. You don't want to be probed and pilloried? Then either don't be corrupt (except in the usual way of sucking up to Wall Street and other rich fucks - that's just sadly acceptable now), like Obama, who could take all the shit and toss it back, or don't fucking run for office.

We'll never know what toxic combination of hubris, narcissism, and lickspittlism got Donald Trump to run for president to win. But we do know that another toxic combination got him elected, and one of the primary ingredients in that poison was the interference of the Russian government. We also know that we are learning all this because the Trump family was too fucking dumb to cover it up well. They're shitty liars as well as being shitty human beings.

You can imagine Karl Rove slapping his bloated forehead when he saw the emails between cartoon louche Richie Gallstone or whatever the fuck that guy's name is and Donald Trump, Jr. You can imagine Rove getting on the phone with John Boehner and the two of them, liars of the first order, screaming with laughter, "The subject line...the subject line is 'Russia-Clinton.'" You can imagine them both calling Mitch McConnell and taunting him about having to deal with this shit. You can imagine McConnell slowly cursing the fact that he worked so hard to get all these lies working, all the cocksucking and ratfucking that went into them, and now they're being brought down by these Trump assholes.

You can be corrupt. You can be stupid. You can't be stupid and corrupt. Otherwise, you don't know when to shut the fuck up. You don't know when to keep your head down. You don't know when to not fucking tweet out the evidence that, at the very least, reveals the very thing everyone has been trying to pin on you.

So now it falls to the professional liars, the liars with experience, to try to unfuck this fucked up situation. You are going to see a hard-press from the right-wing attack dogs about how this is nothing, how the Democrats are more corrupt and destructive, how it was just a Washington naif's error. It's happening already, and they're saying that it's essentially treasonous to not support the president, a hypocrisy that they have no problem with. They'll say it's about bringing down the great man Trump, it's about sour grapes over the failure in the election, and it's about the mighty flag-waving patriots who don't want to see the country dragged down by what they don't even see as a scandal.

Which brings us back to the top of this here post. The Trump lies and power-at-any-cost actions are part and parcel of what the Republican Party does. The GOP is filthy with masterful sleaze merchants. They can fuck your ears and tell you it was God's blessing. It's going to be up to the Democrats to come up with a simple, straightforward narrative here that can slap the Republicans down until they scurry back to the gutter.

How this turns out will reveal who gives a shit about the nation. Who is enraged that this has happened. Who the real patriots are.

(Note: Sure, Democrats went along some of the time with GOP lies because they can get swept up in a lie as much as anyone, but they rarely have been the originators of a big lie in the last 50 years. And, yeah, the country ain't perfect. No shit. Patriots work to make it better.)

7/10/2017

Random Thoughts on Trump(s) and Russia

1. Let's do this one more time, President Pussygrabber McCrazy. Consider this a lesson in the law.

James Comey could have leaked all the classified information he could get his large hands on.

Hillary Clinton could have mishandled classified emails and done something something with uranium and Russia.

Bill Clinton could have told Loretta Lynch exactly what to say about Hillary.

Every news channel that isn't Fox could be totally fake.

Barack Obama could have done nothing about Russian interference in the 2016 election.

Democrats could have colluded with Russians or Ukrainians or another foreign country during the election.

All the intelligence agencies could be leaking to do damage to the administration.

All of those things can be true, but none of them change the fact that you can still be guilty of obstruction of justice.

A murderer cannot use as a defense that his neighbor is a murderer, too. But both Trump and his son constantly tweet out what they say others are guilty of, as if to say, "If you let them get away with it, you have to let us get away with it." It's like neither of them understand that Hillary Clinton isn't the president and that Barack Obama is out of office.

2. Speaking of Pussygrabber McCrazy, Jr., he is still insisting there was nothing untoward about his meeting, along with Paul "Eyes That Have Seen Trump Nude" Manafort and Jared "Would Gladly Fuck a Dead Raccoon If His Father-in-Law Told Him To" Kushner, with a Russian lawyer. His explanation for having giving two seemingly contradictory statements about the meeting is "No inconsistency in statements, meeting ended up being primarily about adoptions. In response to further Q's I simply provided more details." No, motherfucker, you lied and thought you could get away with it. It's just like the campaign lied from the start about hookups with Russians in general.

3. First off, this "adoption" thing is a bullshit excuse. It has to do with the Magnitsky Act, passed by Congress and signed by President Obama in 2012 in order to punish Russian government officials and oligarchs who are involved in human rights abuses and fraud. It froze the assets of some really rich Russian dicks, and Putin had a hissy, so he banned Americans from adopting Russian babies. Putin hates the Act and wants it repealed. The lawyer who Junior met with, Natalia Veselnitskaya, is involved in an effort to get it repealed. Adoption is part of it, but this is about cold fuckin' cash and power.

4. But the really fucked-up part of this is that when a Russian associated with the Kremlin wanted to get together at Trump fuckin' Plaza because she had dirt on Hillary Clinton, Junior's response was, "Well, sure" when it should have been "I better call the FBI." But he couldn't do that because Junior is cut from the same scuzzy cloth as his father and the Trumps likely owe the Russians a metric fuck-ton of money and jump when told to.

4a. One fun part that hasn't gotten much discussion: Veselnitskaya "recalled that after about 10 minutes, either Mr. Kushner or Mr. Manafort left the room." She makes it seem that it's because nothing significant was discussed. But it could have been that they thought, "Oh, crap, this is illegal" and got the fuck out of Dodge. (Or they were rushing to tell Daddy about what they learned. He was in the building that day, June 9, 2016.)

5. Look, I'm not running around with my hair on fire and game theorizing the shit out of all this on Twitter. I've been circumspect, definitely leaning towards the "this is hinky" side of things with Russia. But at some goddamned point, if you keep sucking dicks for money for meth, you're a meth whore. Sure, sure, you suck one or two dicks and get paid and then go buy meth, maybe we can let it slide as tweaker shit. But if you're doing it every day, then you, my friend, have a problem with meth. And handling your finances. But mostly meth.

It's becoming more difficult to deny that the Trump administration is a meth whore. And we know who the john is.

7/05/2017

When It Comes to Medical Care, Republicans Have No Concept of "Horror"


A couple of days ago, on the Facebook, the Indiana Republican Party (motto: "If You Think Mike Pence Is Bad, Have You Met the Rest of Us?") posted a simple request. "What's your Obamacare horror story?" it asked. "Let us know." No doubt, the IN-GOP thought it would get some old farmers saying how the Negro President made them have to change providers after 30 years with Ol' Doc Cornhole or some such nonsense.

Instead, what can charitably be described as a "shitstorm like a tornado hit a sewer line" occurred. People poured out their hearts with tales of how the Affordable Care Act saved their lives or the lives of loved ones or how it helped make living easier for them. "I had a lump in my breast, but I was uninsured...so I waited. The Affordable Care Act was passed and I went to a doctor. I had Stage III cancer. I got treatment and I'm okay now. I will be forever grateful to President Obama for leading the fight to get EVERY AMERICAN insured" is an example of how many of the responses went. And a bunch of the people posting were pissed that Republicans want to take their health insurance away.

The reaction isn't that shocking. By just about any measure, Obamacare has been ridiculously successful, with some hitches, yes, that have been exacerbated because Republican twat mites have refused to work on getting rid of the hitches. What is kind of shockingly sad, though, is what constitutes horror to Republicans.

Look at what the IN-GOP asked for up there: "Did you lose a doctor that you liked? Have your premiums increased? Did your insurer leave the exchange? Are burdensome regulations hurting your small business?"

So "horror" for them is that some people paid more, that small businesses might have to do a thing or two, or that you might have to find a new doctor because your insurance changed. It's not that you might have to watch your wife die of treatable breast cancer or you might need an expensive medication for your heart disease or your kid's pre-existing condition means she can't get insurance to cover her asthma treatment or your brother is an opioid addict and is going to be kicked out of any treatment. No, that's not horror enough. The real horror is that rich fucks might have to have a little less money. The real horror is that we have to act like we're a fucking society, dependent on each other, and not just a bunch of asshole individuals pretending like our actions don't have an effect on others.

Well, motherfuckers, I'd rather pay some more for my health insurance and I'd rather have to change doctors than tell millions of people that I don't think they should get the care they need because I'm such a greedy, selfish prick.

Republicans wouldn't know horror if it rose up out of Mitch McConnell's asshole and ate their faces.

By the way, even the questions the IN-GOP asks are bullshit. Here's one person responding to the last one, about small businesses: "Before the ACA, my company didn't offer insurance benefits to the hundred or so employees at my location. Now, we have a choice of plans. Amazing what a little pressure can accomplish."

Yeah, it is amazing. That's a better word than "horror."

7/04/2017

Francis Hopkinson, One of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence, Was a Sarcastic Bastard

(This is a rerun from last year that, sadly, still applies.)

One of the signers of the Declaration of Independence representing New Jersey, Francis Hopkinson was a smart-ass and one sarcastic bastard. Sure, he was a lawyer, judge (appointed by George Washington), harpsichordist and composer, and a designer of the American flag. But he once asked "whether a Quarter Cask of the public wine" could be payment for his work because that's how the Founders rolled.

In his essays, he could be total dickhead to anyone who pissed him off, including those who thought the United States was better off under the rule of England. For instance, he wrote "On Peace, Liberty, and Independence" in the early 1780s as part of a series of university orations, where he was a snarky fucker, mocking those who were against civil liberties springing from self-rule: "Had Great-Britain succeeded in her views with respect to this country, we should not have been put to the laborious task of framing laws for our own government, a task which we seem but indifferently qualified to perform; we should have been rid of the intolerable plague, the heart-burnings, feuds, cabals, and chicaneries attending popular elections, and we should have been eased of the enormous expense of assemblymen's wages, com|missions, fees and salaries to the officers of government, and a thousand other charges and inconveniences to which we must now be subjected: we should have had nothing more to do, but to pay when called upon, and obey when commanded."

And what he wrote about what independence means when it comes to positions on other nations could be rejiggered just a little to be used on those who would exploit stupidity and xenophobia to maintain power:

"Whilst we were dependent upon Great Britain, we had no trouble in studying the characters, customs, and manners of foreign nations; the English were so kind as to furnish us with all their ideas on these subjects. They told us, that the French are a trifling and contemptible nation;that the Spaniards are proud, sullen, and revengeful; the Germans, ostentatious; the Hollanders, boors; the Russians, savages; and, in short, that the English were themselves the only people fit to live and govern the word, as if all other nations held their dominions by usurpation. How easy was it to believe all this? Implicit faith saves an infinity of trouble. How happy were we in submitting to the government, adopting the prejudices, and aping the manners of a nation, which we conceived to be the glory of the world, and the perfection of human nature?

"Whereas, now, we are under the painful necessity of altering our sentiments. We are compelled by actual experience to acknowledge, that the French are a brave, generous, and polished people: and that none of the other nations are, in truth, such as they have been represented to us. Our commercial connections will convince us that human nature is fundamentally the same in every country. That good and bad men are to be found in every climate; and that the people of England have not actually monopolized all the virtue and wisdom of the world. Every conviction of error is a violence done to the mind, inasmuch as the forcible eradication of a prejudice must be attended with a painful sensation. The blind man is happy in his blindness, and the ignorant content with his ignorance. The wisest of men has somewhere told us that the increase of wisdom is the increase of sorrow."

That is some kick-ass shit right there, a punch right in the Trumps.

7/03/2017

In Brief: Things People on Fox "News" Called Obama "Unpresidential" For

Just for shits and giggles, as the many Trump taint-sniffers at Fox "news" attempt to justify nearly every deranged tweet from the Shitheel in Chief, I decided to take a look-see at the old transcripts from the real FNN. Shockingly, in that it wasn't shocking at all, the syphilitic whores over on Fox took umbrage at anything President Obama did.

For instance, when Obama said that Latinos needed to vote in their interests in the 2010 midterm election, Stuart Varney offered, "It is unpresidential, it's highly divisive." So encouraging people to vote? Unpresidential.

A Fox panel in September 2009 had a discussion about when President Obama called Kanye West a "jackass." Posited host Jon Scott, "If the most powerful man in the world says something unpresidential on a live mic, is that news or not?" Likewise, Brian Kilmeade asked about a 2010 Obama appearance on Jimmy Fallon's Tonight Show, "Do you think this is unpresidential?" This all seems so very quaint now, doesn't it?

Back when Greta Van Susteren had a job and it was at Fox, she took Obama to task for some mild criticism of her employer by President Obama: "I don't think that a president should ever look unpresidential and get into a food fight." She had then-Republican House Whip Eric Cantor on to declare that this was beyond the pale. Of course, in the same October 2009 segment, talking about the possiblity of Obama going on a certain Fox show, Van Susteren said, laughably, "You know, not in a million years do I think Sean Hannity would be disrespectful."

And, finally, because time is a flat circle, here is motherfuckin' Kellyanne Conway on Hannity's Hategasm Jizzorama: "I always find it to be so undignified and so unpresidential for President Obama to pick on what he considers to be right-wing media. You're the president of the United States. Go destroy ISIS and get millions of women out of extreme poverty, please. That's your day job." When did she say that? A little over a year ago. June 3, 2016. And she still hasn't burst into flames from the methane of her own bullshit.

This is not to mention the tan suit, that time Common performed at the White House, Obama's feet on the desk, the Dijon mustard (no really), the golfing, fer fuck's sake, and every other time racist mountains were made out of racist molehills. Meanwhile, as far as Fox is concerned now, with a few exceptions, like Shepard Smith and the occasional surge of integrity from Chris Wallace, Donald Trump is just about a model for being presidential and should be treated with the utmost respect, deference, and lovingly-lapped analingus.

(Bonus fun: You know how everyone was all a-Twitter over former Bush White House communications director Nicolle Wallace for ripping into Trump for his treatment of women? Here's what she told Hannity in 2010 about Obama: "He never sides with the American people.")