Open Thread–2/4/2019

Posted by TomCat at 10:20 am Open Thread, Plus, Politics

Feb 042020

Yesterday’s trip to the hospital was gruesome. TriMet Lift got me there an hour early, so I had to wait there for an hour. The tests, as I had told the doctors all along, was fine. Unlike my fart, my heart is completely healthy. They got done with me two hours early, so I called TriMet to see if I could get an earlier ride. No. In fact, they screwed up and did not pick me up for my 3:34 – 4:04 PM window until 6:10. That Lift Bus was crowded, so I did not get home until 7:25 PM, 25 minutes after my winter bedtime. Needless to say, I’m so pooped, I’m bleary eyed.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:49 (average 5:54). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

I’m on O₂ too. I’m not a Republican, so I’m not a moron.

Short Takes:

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): In What Amounts To GOP ‘Bluff-Calling,’ Joe Manchin Proposes Senate Censure Trump

I must be hallucinating from being over tired. I actually agree with DINO Joe! After the conviction vote fails, a foregone conclusion, I would support a censure vote, as a way to further embarrass Republicans, most of whom would goose-step with criminal Fuhrer Trump*. RESIST!!

From YouTube (Late Show Channel): GOP Senators Give Lame Excuses For Voting Against Witnesses In Trump Impeachment Trial

Lame excuses? Since when has the Fascist Republican Reich given any other kind? RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): The Mamas & The Papas – Monday Monday

Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue!!

Open Thread–2/1/2020

Posted by TomCat at 9:41 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Feb 012020

It’s another muggy day, here in the CatBox. Tomorrow is a WWWendy day, so I’m not too sure how much I’ll have for you then. Then Monday, I’ll be gone for my cardiac stress test from 9:30 in the morning until around 5 PM with no food and no nap. I’ll be exhausted, so I may not cover Iowa very well. Have a great weekend!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:05 (average 5:50). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Short Takes:

From Alternet: 3. The Soviet Union and China achieved state capitalism, not socialism

As leader of the Soviet Union, Lenin once said that socialism was a goal, not yet an achieved reality. The Soviet had, instead, achieved “state capitalism.” A socialist party had state power, and the state had become the industrial capitalist displacing the former private capitalists. The Soviet revolution had changed who the employer was; it had not ended the employer/employee relationship. Thus, it was—to a certain extent—capitalist.

Lenin’s successor, Stalin, declared that the Soviet Union had achieved socialism. In effect, he offered Soviet state capitalism as if it were the model for socialism worldwide. Socialism’s enemies have used this identification ever since to equate socialism with political dictatorship. Of course, this required obscuring or denying that (1) dictatorships have often existed in capitalist societies and (2) socialisms have often existed without dictatorships.

After initially copying the Soviet model, China changed its development strategy to embrace instead a state-supervised mix of state and private capitalism focused on exports. China’s powerful government would organize a basic deal with global capitalists, providing cheap labor, government support, and a growing domestic market. In exchange, foreign capitalists would partner with Chinese state or private capitalists, share technology, and integrate Chinese output into global wholesale and retail trade systems. China’s brand of socialism—a hybrid state capitalism that included both communist and social-democratic streams—proved it could grow faster over more years than any capitalist economy had ever done.

The only Socialism we need to fear in the US is the National Socialism of the Republican Reich. This is the third of ten things you should know about Socialism. Please click through for the other nine. RESIST!!

From YouTube (CNN Channel): Watch ER doctor confront Mike Pence

While evading the question, Republican traitor Pence failed to mention that he fought Medicaid expansion in Indiana tooth and nail. It passed in spite of him. What a liar! RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): Neil Diamond – Sweet Caroline High Quality

Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue!!

Get Out a Black Armband

Posted by TomCat at 8:46 am Politics

Jan 312020

I hate to say it, but it’s time to get out a black armband, because a national day of shame is upon us. Since Senator Lamar Alexander [R-TN] decided to goose-step with his criminal Fuhrer, Donald Trump*, instead of representing his constituents, it appears that Bought Bitch Midnight Moscow Mitch is about to successfully hide his Fuhrer’s crimes by blocking documents and witnesses by blocking documents and witnesses at the impeachment trial.

0131AlexanderBitch

The questioning phase is over. On Friday, the trial will resume at 1 p.m. Eastern, when senators will begin a debate over including additional witnesses and documents in the trial.
Republicans have felt increasingly confident that they will have the support to block a vote to subpoena new witnesses, like the former national security adviser John R. Bolton, who Democrats argue could provide crucial new information. This was made more likely Thursday night when Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee, who was seen as a swing vote, announced that he would not support calling additional witnesses…

Inserted from <NY Times>

Sen. Lamar Alexander Makes ‘Preposterous’ Statement About Impeachment

If that isn’t impeachable conduct, then what the hell is?

Sen. Jeff Merkley: This is a tragedy in every possible way

Jeff is my Senator. I worked on his campaign to help him oust Gordon “Goosestep” Smith [R-OR]. I could not agree with him more than this!

Finally, this is what Republicans are doing!

RESIST!!

Slinging it for the Criminal

Posted by TomCat at 9:10 am Politics

Jan 282020

We’re now in the third and last day of stupidity, as displayed by the clown car of hypocrites representing impeached criminal, Donald “quid pro quo” Trump*. Apparently the release of information from John Bolton’s Book caught them off guard. Except for a weak attempt to deflect it near the end of their presentation, they ignored it. In the process, they made fools of themselves.

I am glad I am leaving this place on Tuesday and heading to Iowa, where some decent people are contending to head a government and a political system so corrupted and debased at this point that the ship of state most closely resembles that homeless wandering garbage barge from 1987. The last thing I saw was Republican Senators John Barrasso and Mike Braun, red-faced and hollering, because some reporters wanted to know precisely how much of the bullshit slung by the White House lawyers on Monday afternoon anyone should believe.

Make no mistake about it. From about 4 o’clock, the time former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi rose to speak, until about 6, when a longtime lawyer for El Caudillo del Mar-a-Lago named Eric Herschmann wrapped up what amounted to some MAGA rally cosplay, a monstrously obvious fraud was perpetrated on the Senate, sitting as a court of impeachment. If any lawyer in any municipal court in the country had lied and misrepresented the facts of a case involving a speeding ticket as thoroughly as Bondi and Herschmann did here, that lawyer’s license would have been pulled by lunchtime. However, Chief Justice John Roberts, perhaps exhausted by the effort it took to extend the work of Breckinridge Long into the 21st century on Monday morning, sat there like one of the marble vice presidents in the niches of the visitor’s galleries above. A fraud was perpetrated on the court over which Roberts was presiding, and he had to know it.

I thought the defense case had scraped bottom when Ken Starr was brought out of cold storage to lecture the Senate on the dangers of a runaway impeachment process. But that turned out to be merely particularly odious concern-trolling. Irony died a long time ago and all Starr was doing was digging up the casket and setting it ablaze. However, it was the Bondi-Herschmann pas de deux ended up shredding the last possible rags of dignity that still clung to the truth in this farce. Bondi began by explaining how it was the House managers that forced her to get up and talk about the Bidens and Burisma. Of course, Bondi was the Florida attorney general who, in 2013, buried that state’s investigation into the fraudulent Trump University after a $25,000 check from the Trump Foundation landed in her campaign account. At the moment, she’s making $115-large as a lobbyist for the government of Qatar. So, naturally, she was the lawyer chosen to crank up the innuendo machine regarding the Bidens and Burisma, especially since the Republicans Have The Votes, so nothing else matters.

Reading her prepared argument like a seventh-grader delivering a history report, Bondi found herself inevitably stanning for the deeply corrupt former Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin. In reality, Shokin was removed because the government of the United States, the World Bank, and virtually every official in the western world except Sir Paul McCartney knew he was for sale and wanted him gone. Biden, then vice president, had been tasked with delivering the warning from the United States to Ukraine. Shokin had opened an investigation into Burisma but he had then stuffed it. That was part of why everybody thought he was a crook. Bondi, however, asked us to sympathize with Viktor Shokin, the victim of Biden shenanigans, a theory that has been debunked from here to glory. I swear to god, if they’d put a menu from Denny’s in Bondi’s folder, she’d have blamed Hunter Biden for the Grand Slam breakfast. [emphasis added]

Inserted from <Esquire>

Here are three video clops that shed more light of this absurd defense.

Jake Tapper fact-checks President Trump’s defense team during Senate impeachment trial

Of course the Trump* defense team lied. If they weren’t lying, displaying hate and racism, or acting out predatory greed, we could not tell they’re Republicans.

What Trump’s defense team left out of their impeachment defense

The Republican Reich is desperate to keep the truth away from American Voters.

Joe: A Confederacy Of Dunces Defends President Donald Trump

Joe Scarborough was hilarious, but I think these folks were stating the obvious. If these lawyers were anything but a Confederation of Dunces, they would not be defending the criminal Fuhrer Trump*!

RESIST!!

Bolton Busts His Fuhrer

Posted by TomCat at 8:55 am Politics

Jan 272020

Today we proceed into the second day of Republican Fuhrer Trump’s* defense team attempts to cobble together enough lies to give Republican Senators an excuse to acquit their Fuhrer. It is not going well for them, because every time they stake out a position, more information comes out that blows their case out of the water. In response to the revelations about John Bolton’s book, I predict they will just lie and say the evidence does not exist.

We finally got a taste Sunday night of what former national security adviser John
Bolton might tell President Trump’s Senate impeachment trial — if he’s called to
testify, that is.

What we learned reinforced the potential peril for Republicans if they refuse to lethim do so.

The New York Times reported Sunday that Bolton makes a series of very big
Ukraine-related claims in an unpublished manuscript of his upcoming book, which is now slated to be released in March.

Chief among them:

Bolton writes that he heard Trump say explicitly
that the withholding of military aid would continue until Ukraine announced
an investigation involving the Bidens — implicating Trump directly in a
quid pro quo for the first time and contradicting the Trump team’s
defense.

He writes that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said
privately that there was nothing to the Trump team’s claims that
then-ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch was corrupt — suggesting this
was indeed a smear campaign and that Pompeo recognized it as such, even as
he didn’t defend Yovanovitch publicly.

He writes that he raised concerns about Rudolph W.
Giuliani’s efforts in Ukraine with Attorney General William P. Barr after
Trump’s July call with Ukraine’s president — despite the Justice Department
saying Barr learned about the call in mid-August.

He writes that acting White House chief of staff
Mick Mulvaney was present for one of Trump’s calls with Giuliani about
Yovanovtich, even though Mulvaney has told associates that he stayed out of
those conversations to protect Trump’s and Giuliani’s attorney-client
privilege.

In other words: Bolton is naming names — lots of names — and directly contradicting what top administration officials are saying.

Inserted from <Washington Post>

Adam Schiff had more to day about this.

Adam Schiff: John Bolton’s book blasts a hole in Trump defense

Sadly I fear this will do us no good. I ‘d be willing to bet that Republican Senators are far too vile and craven to allow American voters to see this testimony.

RESIST!!

Open Thread–1/26/2020

Posted by TomCat at 8:17 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Jan 262020

It’s a busy day here in the CatBox, as WWWendy will be here in about an hour. I’m feeling a bit better as, after throwing up most of the day yesterday, I kept supper down. Then I kept breakfast down this morning. Have a great Sunday!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:07 (average 5:28). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Short Takes:

From NY Times and YouTube: Even before the gas chambers were destroyed and the savage toll of years of industrialized mass murder revealed to the world, prisoners at the largest Nazi concentration camp were already repeating two words: Never again.

But as the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz approaches, an occasion being marked by events around the world and culminating in a solemn ceremony at the former death camp on Monday that will include dozens of aging Holocaust survivors, Piotr Cywinski, the director of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, is worried…

…Across Europe and in the United States, there is concern about a resurgence of anti-Semitism. Toxic political rhetoric and attacks directed at groups of peoples — using language to dehumanize them — that were once considered taboo have become common across the world’s democracies.

To find examples of the rabid antisemitism that led to Auschwitz, one need look no further than the US Republican Reich. Impeached Fuhrer Trump called the Republicans in this video “fine people”. RESIST!!

From YouTube (CNN Channel): New audio and video undermine President Trump’s claim about Lev Parnas

So the liar who had “never met Parnas” and didn’t even “know who Parnas is” knew him well enough to discuss the strategy of firing a US Ambassador and blackmailing Ukraine in the face of military aggression from Trump* buddy Putin [R-RU]. The Republican lackeys in the Senate wouldn’t mind hearing witnesses themselves. They already know how guilty Trump* is and don’t care. Those Republican cowards are afraid to have American voters hear the witnesses. RESIST!!

From YouTube (SNL Channel): Alan Dershowitz Argues for Trump Cold Open

The faces are slightly different, but the satirical reality they display is spot-on! However, Dershowitz should have taken his client downstairs and left him with his perv buddy Jeff! RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): Buffalo Springfield – For What It’s Worth 1967

I’ll never tire of this one. Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue!!

Open Thread–1/25/2020

Posted by TomCat at 8:32 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Jan 252020

I’ve been throwing up most of the morning, but am pushing through, because I don’t want to get behind. Tomorrow is a WWWendy day, so please expect no more than a Personal Update or an Open Thread. Have a great weekend.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:24 (average 5:34). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Short Takes:

From The New Yorker: Desperately trying to change the narrative after a week of damaging presentations, Donald J. Trump’s defense team is scrambling to find an example of one law that Trump did not break, sources confirmed on Friday.

In concert with two of Jeffrey Epstein’s most prominent defenders, Alan Dershowitz and Kenneth Starr, Trump’s personal attorney Jay Sekulow has been scouring federal, state, and municipal law books in the hopes of finding one statute that Trump, for whatever reason, did not violate.

“So far, no luck,” a source close to the defense team said.

Dang, Andy! They’re going to be searching forever! RESIST!!

From YouTube (CNN Channel): Attorney: Trump caught on tape demanding ambassador’s firing

I’d recognize that pig squeal anywhere! Is there anything that the criminal Trump* has not lied about? RESIST!!

From YouTube (Adam Schiff Channel): Rep. Schiff Concludes Senate Trial Argument: Give America a Fair Trial. She’s Worth It.

Schiff was masterful. Now get ready for wall to wall lies and obfuscation from the Republican Reich! RESIST!!

From YouTube (a blast from the past): Simon & Garfunkel – Mrs. Robinson (Audio)

Ah… the memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue!!

Open Thread–1/24/2020

Posted by TomCat at 8:47 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Jan 242020

It’s a tired day here in the CatBox. I didn’t sleep well last night, but I kept my food down all day yesterday and this morning. I’m going to do my best to force a week free of Medical Mayhem, before I let them perform more in their endless barrage of tests. Pardon my frustration, please. I’m just sick of sick. TGIF!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:52 (average 5:09). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Cartoon:

Short Takes:

From Crooks and Liars: George Conway and his new group called The Lincoln Project created a second negative political ad targeting the vulnerable Senator from Maine, Susan Collins.

In the ad, they highlight the supposed “independent” credentials negated by her actions. They demand that Collins do her job during the Senate impeachment trial.

Amen! RESIST!!

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): Adam Schiff Ends Day With Powerful Argument For Trump’s Removal

I think Schiff was speaking more to the American people more than to the Senators, whose ears and minds are closed. The real trial is the one in November. The onus falls on voters to send criminal Resident Trump* and the entire Republican Reich the way of the Whig Party! RESIST!!

From YouTube (a change of pace): Patsy Cline – Sweet Dreams

I’m so old that even this brings memories! RESIST!!

Vote Blue!!

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