Golden State Warriors Finally Visit With President

NBA champs, the Golden State Warriors, continued their refusal to meet with the incompetent fraud occupying the White House.  But while in D.C. recently, they did have a nice visit with a real president.

I'm a Cleveland Cavaliers fan at heart, but I admire Golden State's principles.

Dinky Donny Yields to Powerful Pelosi

After more than a month of useless, pointless, expensive egomania, Orange Julius relented and decided to do things Nancy's way.  He re-opened the government for three weeks, until February 15th, his next utterly made-up deadline.  He's still insisting the Democrats give him $5.7 billion for his stupid wall, or else he'll take (steal) the money from unspent government funds by declaring a national "emergency."  Of course there is no emergency, other than Dolt 45's continued existence.  He's trying to shake us down for his vanity project, for a campaign applause line.

"Build the wall" began not as a serious idea but as a mnemonic to remind the Drumpfkopf to talk about immigration -- "wall" being a shorter word, always something helpful to the weak mind of Trump.  Declaring an emergency for an obvious non-emergency is a legally dubious method of funding, will face court challenges and probably won't work.  Nothing has yet.  And if Trump's wall failure makes Ann Coulter angry, great!  I'm in favor of anything that makes her mad.  It must be right.

Trump's a Filthy Mobster

The point is obvious and has been made many times before, but it was reinforced last week with some Big Apple-style witness tampering.

Both Frito Corleone and his TV lawyer Rudy Ghouliani threatened the fixer Michael Cohen's father-in-law ("He's in organized crime!") in hopes that Michael would get cold feet about testifying before Congress.  He did, but Congress subpoenaed his ass anyway.

Trump henchman Roger Stone threatened to kill Randy Credico's dog.  Credico may have knowledge about the Wikileaks-Russian connection to the Trump campaign.  Stone was arrested and indicted by Robert Mueller.  Try your dog-killing from jail, asshole.

Just typical New York mob tactics.

More Perspective On The Covington MAGA Boys

Marshall Jolly is an Episcopal minister currently working in North Carolina.  A native of Paris, Kentucky, he previously worked in northern Kentucky.  What follows are his comments shared on his Twitter feed.

PASTOR MARSHALL JOLLY
ON COVINGTON CATHOLIC CULTURE

I've seen a lot of chatter about the disgraceful incident involving students from Covington Catholic High School and an Indigenous American and Veteran in Washington, DC this weekend. This morning, as news of the "full video" began to break, people started hedging, saying that there were "multiple perspectives." Here's my perspective.

I served an Episcopal parish in Northern Kentucky, approximately 15 minutes from Covington Catholic High School. It's a prestigious all-male school with a reputation for strong academics and strong athletics. You can learn that much from the website.

What you won't learn from the website is that there is a sinister pattern of similar behavior within the Diocese. While the Bishop there concerns himself with bizarre pronouncements (such as admonishing the faithful not to hold hands during the recitation of the Lord's Prayer) and quashing "unorthodox hymns" that are otherwise approved for use in the Catholic church, he also has created a culture that is not only anti-LGBT, but also actively seeking out teachers and other administrators who might even hold sympathetic views toward people who are LGBT.

As a (retired) soccer referee, I dreaded officiating matches where Covington Catholic was involved. The fans were always among the rudest, most disrespectful, and mean-spirited that I've encountered--and I've refereed for a long time at almost every level of the game! Student after student has come forward over the years to try and shed light on the abuses that not just LGBT students faced, but students of color. Racial epithets and slurs were commonplace in the halls.

My point is that what we're seeing on the (many) videos circulating should not come as a shock. It is a continuation of a long and disgusting pattern of toxicity and abuse that has been allowed and even encouraged at all levels of the school and, as far as I can tell, from the diocese.

While we might be concerning ourselves with "who moved first" or "who moved toward whom" in the video, I encourage you to reflect on this: notice the posture and demeanor of the young man. There is a troubling display of xenophobia embedded here. It's the kind that says that white bodies (read: white, cis, straight, male bodies) can be anywhere they choose at any time, but that non-white bodies (read: non-cis, straight, male bodies) must first seek permission to exist outside of their “place.” This is a window into a perverse system that thrives on toxic, fragile masculinity embedded with xenophobia. And it’s not pretty. Let those who have ears to hear, listen.

Clothes Make The Man, or What Your MAGAt Hat Means

You're aware of the ugly incident last Friday on the National Mall in D.C. -- a three-way clash involving a small number of Native Americans participating in the Indigenous Peoples March, a large group of white Catholic high school boys participating in an anti-abortion march, and five members of a weird religious sect who were there to "preach" at anyone who happened to be there.

The Black Hebrew Israelites were engaging in some confrontational street "ministry," first haranguing the Indian group, then giving the business to the boys on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

Nathan Phillips, an Omaha tribal elder, got between the two groups while trying to lead his marchers up the steps to conclude their day in the memorial.  His way to the top was blocked by the boys from Covington Catholic, who taunted and harassed him, yelling "Build the wall," "Go back to the reservation," doing the tomahawk chop and a mock-Indian dance.  One of the Covington boys, Nick Sandmann, stood chin to chin with Mr. Phillips, silently smiling and smirking.

Covington Catholic is in greater Cincinnati, across the Ohio River on the Kentucky side.  It may not be surprising for the area, but it's disappointing and inappropriate for a school to pull a busload of kids out of class to join in an anti-abortion protest.  That's your tuition/indoctrination dollars at work.

Most disappointing and inappropriate of all is the school allowed (encouraged?) its students to walk around our nation's capitol while wearing MAGA hats and sweatshirts.  Doesn't the school administration realize what MAGA clothes symbolize?  How about the parents and chaperones?

Wearing a MAGA hat means you proudly support and identify with the fake president who is a racist, misogynist, belligerent provocateur.  It means you too are a racist hate-monger.  It means you want to provoke a response in others.  It sends a loathsome message.  You might as well wear a swastika, or a KKK hood, or a Confederate flag.

The face of the incident, young Mr. Sandmann wore his MAGA hat that day and, after the fact, has now hired a crisis management P.R. firm to help him navigate the shit river of his own making.  Some of that lovely spin:

• Sandmann says his obstruction of Mr. Phillips was "not disrespectful."
• He says he "had every right" to stand in Phillips way, and claimed that Phillips "invaded my personal space."
• Said he was thinking, "I'll stand here as long as you want to bang this drum in my face."
• Said, "I'm a faithful Christian and practicing Catholic."
• Proclaimed, "We're a Catholic school.  They don't tolerate racism.  None of my classmates are racist people."

Rule Number 1, Nick, if you're really so pious and non-racist, you should never wear a MAGA hat, you insolent dumbass!

Rule Number 2, if your school permitted its students to wear blackface to a basketball game, maybe they do tolerate racism after all.

 

We Don't "Negotiate" With Terrorists

Wasn't Mexico going to pay?  How did we get here?

December 11th -- "If we don't get what we want . . . "  Trump said he'd be proud to shut down the government if he didn't get his $5.7 billion for his fucking wall.  He told Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi he wouldn't blame them.  He lied. 

December 19th -- The Senate overwhelmingly passed a short-term spending bill to keep the government open.  It included $1.6 billion for existing border security, but not $5.7 billion for Trumpty Dumpty's wall.  The House was expected to pass the Senate measure the next day, then move it on to Trump for his signature on the 21st, the deadline.  Trump said he wouldn't sign anything unless it contained $5.7 billion for a wall.

December 20th -- The still GOP-dominated House added $5.7 billion for a wall to the Senate's spending bill, meaning the Senate needed to vote on it again.  There were not enough votes in the Senate (they needed 60) to pass the House-revised bill.

December 21st -- The government shutdown began at midnight.

January 2nd -- Schumer and Pelosi went to the White House to try to get Trump to re-open government while Congress continued to work on a bipartisan deal on funding for border security.  Trump flatly refused.

January 3rd -- The new Congress was sworn in, with a Democratic majority in the House.  The House passed two symbolic bills to re-open the government now and delay border funding for later.  Mitch McConnell said he won't allow anything to come to the Senate floor unless he knows Trump will sign it.

January 4th -- Trump threatens to prolong the shutdown for "months even years" and also threatens to declare a national emergency as a means to bypass Congress and get his wall money without their approval.

January 9th -- In another White House meeting with Democratic leaders, Trump's idea of negotiation continued to be:  "Gimme $5.7 billion for a wall and I'll open the government."  Appropriately, the Dems refused and Trump stormed out of the room.  "Bye-bye."

January 19th -- Trump made a "major announcement" on the shutdown and border wall funding.  His offer to Democrats:  "Gimme $5.7 billion for a wall and I'll give you three more years of temporary protection for some immigrants (DACA and TPS)" -- a temporary reprieve for some refugees in exchange for very expensive, very ineffective and very permanent wall.  Dems were unimpressed.  Trump said McConnell would bring this proposal to a vote and called his plan a bipartisan package.  No Democrats were consulted.

January 21st -- McConnell said he'll bring Trump's proposal to the Senate floor sometime this week.  Such a show-vote is a waste of time.  It'll need 60 votes in the Senate, which is highly unlikely.  Even if it got 60, it would still need to pass the D-controlled House, which is impossible.

So here we are, one month into the longest government shutdown in history, with no end in sight.  As the timeline demonstrates, the responsibility lies, without a doubt, with one lone gobshite, Dolt 45 the fake president.  By his blundering, heartless, tomfool tactics, he is holding 800,000 government workers and their families hostage to his fuck-witted whims.  Hostage-taking is a form of terrorism, and as you know, we don't negotiate with terrorists.

Everyone has great sympathy for Trump's hostages and the financial hardships he has created for them.  But as much as we feel for them, we cannot "negotiate" with Trump the terrorist.  We must not pay his $5.7 billion ransom, nor give him any money first.

Trump is a notorious liar.  There's no negotiating with him, no reason to believe he'll keep his word about anything.  So we can't let Little Donny Two-Scoops get his wall, or he'll be encouraged to take hostages again and again to get his way.  We must make him re-open the government first, and then we'll go back to square one.

Beyond that, there's absolutely no border emergency and no reason for a border wall -- a wall is an implausible "solution" to an imaginary problem.  Border walls are anti-American, we don't want or need one, and the vast majority are opposed, even some Republicans.  So we must make Trump own his shutdown.  Its effects are mushrooming, more people are feeling the pain, Trump's ratings are plummeting, and we can outlast him.  In the court of public opinion, he'll soon conclude that inflicting all this agony for the sake of Ann Coulter's approval just ain't worth it.

Stay strong and keep the faith.

Round-Up Of Ridiculosity

The Pathetically Petty Payback Mentality of the Pretend President.  Timed for maximum inconvenience, the Baby-In-Chief waited until the last minute to cancel a trip of Nancy Pelosi's bipartisan Congressional delegation scheduled to depart this afternoon for Belgium, Egypt and Afghanistan.  Just as she controls access to the House of Representatives, he controls access to government aircraft.  So he wrote her a note telling her she couldn't use government planes until the "Shutdown"* was over, but could fly commercial instead.  Of course, the Man-Baby had used a government aircraft when he visited troops in Iraq during the shutdown, but somehow that was different.  At age 72, he's still just a spoiled brat, a juvenile jerk.
(*His brief 132-word note contained 8 instances of unnecessary and grammatically incorrect capitalization, e.g. "Strong Border Security." 😖)

Real Food Heroes.  tRump hosted the national champion Clemson football team at the White House for a celebratory meal of non-nutritional, cold, greasy fast food.  He tweet-bragged about personally paying for "hundreds of hamberders."  A low-class embarrassment, like everything else he does. But some real food heroes stepped up with much better offers of real food:  Michael Strahan will feed them lobster and caviar.  Nick Kokonas, owner of Alinea, a 3-star Chicago restaurant, invited them to the Windy City for a gourmet $200-a-plate dinner.  Ayesha Curry, chef of International Smoke, invited them to her restaurant for a "real feast with no ten-cent dipping sauces."  Even Quavo of the Migos offered to feed them and show them "how champs are supposed to be treated.  Y'all welcome to come by anytime."  In the near future, it looks like nobody will be eating better than the Clemson football players.  And hamberders won't be on the menu.

The Other Confirmation Hearing.  Andrew Wheeler, the acting EPA chief and former coal lobbyist, is finally getting a hearing to be confirmed as the real-deal administrator.  I'm ashamed to admit that Wheeler is a native Ohioan.  He may not have the unethical stench of his predecessor Scott Pruitt, but he has the same ideological desire to destroy anti-pollution regulations and protect the fossil fuel industry.  When asked, Wheeler said climate change was not a "crisis," but merely an "issue" that must addressed "globally."  Translation:  Until the rest of the world cleans up, we'll do nothing and will allow American business the continuing opportunity to pollute for profit.

Parochial School Fool.  Karen Pence, wife of VP Holy Mike Pence, will return as an elementary level art teacher at Immanuel Christian in Virginia.  The school is adamantly anti-LGBT, literally prohibiting the presence of any LGBT students, parents or staff, and requiring a "biblical lifestyle."*
How is this blatant bigotry allowed?  Immanuel Christian is a private school.  You pay tuition for the religious freedom privilege of having your child taught that gay people are dangerous and hell-bound.  With the news of the VP's wife joining the faculty of this hotbed of homophobia, activists are sending 100 copies of John Oliver's A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo to the school.  It's a children's book about a boy bunny who loves another boy bunny -- just the thing to make a Pence tense.

(*If you're truly living the "biblical lifestyle," you live in a small village of small, mudbrick houses with no safe drinking water and no plumbing at all.  Your meals consist mainly of bread.  There are open latrines, and dirt and dust everywhere, along with slavery, crucifixions, and the stoning of non-virginal women.  With such a lifestyle, you might just wanna kick off your sandals and get carnal with the cutest goat in the herd.  That's biblical as hell!)