August 10, 2017

I just realized one of the main reasons Rachel Maddow's show is my favorite.

There are a lot of good reasons, of course, but the one I just realized is that she never plays videos of Trump speaking. I can't stand to listen to him and I'm always hitting the mute button.

Edit: Oops! I'm wrong. Rachel just played a short video of Trump speaking.

August 7, 2017

Paul Krugman borrows atheist's favorite cat for the role of "Debt Ceiling Cat."

https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/

August 6, 2017

In apparent desperation Fox News stoops to a new low, asking "Would you even care if he was guilty?"

I don't normally click on Fox News links, but you have to admit this is some powerful click-bait:

Would you even care if he was guilty?

And yes, they're referring to Trump. I couldn't help thinking of that Febreze commercial that goes "sometimes the things you love can stink."

August 5, 2017

Kim Jong-un is doing bad things, so we're punishing his victims. Makes perfect sense, right?

August 3, 2017

Where's Rachel? That's three nights in a row that she's missed so far.

August 1, 2017

Do all of those wild hand gestures of Trump's include any "tells" that reveal when he's lying?

Yes, I know, you can tell he's lying if his lips are moving.

But seriously, just as poker players can read the body language of their opponents and know what cards they're holding, maybe all of those crazy gestures that Trump makes as he speaks can be read and used to identify when he's telling what he knows to be a particularly egregious lie.

I'm not a poker player, and beside that I find it extremely difficult to listen to Trump, but maybe someone who's good at reading body language might want to look into this.

July 31, 2017

Imagine if Russia hadn't really tried to interfere with our election.

Edited for clarity:

Yes, Russia interfered in our election. <-- Read it again.

But I was thinking that even if Putin and his Russian hackers hadn't interfered, or even tried to interfere, with our election, under the current circumstances Putin would still be in a strong position to compel Trump to do his bidding. Here's my reasoning:

1. Whether or not it's true, what matters is that our intelligence agencies are firmly convinced that Putin interfered with the election. Congress accepts that and is acting accordingly with sanctions against Russia.

2. Given that, does Putin have anything to lose if he publicly admits that he interfered, and that he did so in collusion with Trump and his minions? Such an admission might not have any serious consequences for Putin but would be devastating for Trump.

3. If so, this puts Putin in a position to compel Trump to do what he wants, or else. Putin has the power to destroy Trump.

For all we know, this could be what was privately discussed over dinner on July 7 at the G20.

If this makes sense it would presumably disqualify Trump for a security clearance, let alone the presidency, but maybe I'm being naive and it isn't plausible at all. I'd like to hear what others think about this.

July 28, 2017

Dark Helmet attends Trump's speech in Brentwood, NY.

July 25, 2017

Fake News from CNN! (Ha ha, just kidding.)

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/25/politics/trump-sessions-bullying/index.html

CNN says

... that came less than 24 hours after Trump had described Sessions as "beleagured" in another tweet...

The use of quotation marks implies that Trump misspelled beleaguered, but in fact, he didn't. See for yourself:

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/889467610332528641
Fake news! Fake news! We can be confident that even though Trump is contemptuous of virtually all of the other resources at a U.S. president's disposal, he does rely on his spell checker.


Edit: It's just a joke! Yes, I understand that what actually happened was that the CNN reporter didn't know how to spell beleaguered.

July 23, 2017

It's time to reassign the "miserable failure" Google Bomb to he whom it clearly & obviously belongs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_bomb