From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
What Made Trump Look Like an Even Bigger Jackass in January
Sharks
This little shit
This bald guy
Michael Wolff
His chief of staff
His “other nut job”
Fox News’s fake news
His fake news awards
His corrupt D.C. hotel
His “button that works”
His lazy work schedule
The “State of the Uniom”
His big fat shithole mouth
His record on airline safety
His former top Nazi adviser
His current top Nazi adviser
His “consensual” presidency
The fake fighter jets in his head
His stupid voter fraud commission
The deep state “secret society” texts
His tobacco company-loving CDC director
The “sacred” National Anthem he can’t sing
The porn star with whom he cheated on his wife
The LPGA pro who confirms he “cheats like hell” at golf
The “very best people” he hires who mysteriously disappear
Bullshit Mountain: the one thing in this country that still stands tall in the age of Trump.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold...[Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Thursday, February 1, 2018
Note: A quick heads-up that there will be no C&J Monday on account of a severe case of Februaryfifthophobia. Back Tuesday covered in dust bunnies from cowering under the bed.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til the Winter Olympics in South Korea: 9
Days 'til the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show: 9
Estimated deficit for 2018, the highest since 2010 (when Obama’s stimulus was pulling us out of the Great Recession) according to AP: $765 billion
Number of “personal” flamethrowers (w/ a 2-foot-long flame to skirt federal restrictions) Elon Musk has sold through his Boring company: 10,000
Percent chance that California Assemblyman Miguel Santiago has vowed to make the devices illegal in the state, “given that we’re coming off of the worst wildfire season in history”: 100%
Average cost of a Super Bowl ticket in 2008 and 2018, respectively: $3,000 / $5,000
Cost of a 30-second ad: $5 million
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Your Thursday Molly Ivins Moment:
Come on, Americans: this sucks.
Democracy and capitalism are separate systems: one political, one economic. Capitalism is the best system yet invented for the creation of wealth, but it does dog on its own for social justice; it must be mitigated; it needs to be refereed by government intervention (and the refs damn well better not be on the take). Otherwise, we're going to end up like the banana republics in Latin America---rich people shut up behind high walls and the rest of us in slums. This is not rocket science. We've had decades and even centuries of experience with capitalism: we know how to harness it so it works for most of the people most of the time."
---From Who Let the Dogs In?
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Puppy Pic of the Day: That’s usin’ the old bean!
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CHEERS to February! For the shortest month, it sure packs a lot of goodies in it. Some of the highlights:
Black History Month, more daylight, Super Bowl Sunday (Philadelphia is going to win, I guarantee it…which means I just jinxed the Eagles ha ha ha GO PATRIOTS!), Waitangi Day in New Zealand, Heritage Day in Canada, Valentine's Day, Cordova Ice Worm Day, Mardi Gras (the 13th), George & Abe's awesome storewide mattress sale, Charles Dickens Day, the Oscars (I hope they give Warren Beatty a do-over), Create A Vacuum Day (chaired this year by Donald Trump because he's #1 at suckage), National Pancake Day, but NO full moon this month because January stole it yesterday. (If I was February I’d be calling Judge Judy.) Movies range from Black Panther (first black Marvel superhero to get a solo movie, and early word is it’s fantastic) to more ridiculously lame S&M hijinks in Fifty Shades of Oh My God Those Two Must be 150 Years Old By Now. Oh, and tomorrow is Groundhog Day. Or as it’s also known: every day between now and January 20, 2021.
CHEERS to the state of the resistance. On the same day that our Stable Genius delivered his bigly-unpopular State of the Union address at the speed of world’s-most-deranged-tortoise, CNN was delivering bad news to Paul Ryan and his out-of-control orcs in the House: change is a’ comin’…
According to CNN ratings, 61 Republican seats are either toss-ups (15), leaning GOP (21) or likely GOP (25). Compare that to just 22 Democratic seats in any sort of jeopardy this fall and you begin to grasp the depth of Republican vulnerability. […]
Retirements in hard-to-hold districts have ravaged Republicans this year. Already 35 House GOPers have announced plans to retire or run for other offices this fall, far ahead of historic patterns.
Democrats have experienced a candidate recruitment windfall thanks to historic trends and a current political environment dominated by Trump's unpopularity. Combine that glut of quality candidates with a widening playing field and the weight of history and Democrats look to be in very strong position to win back control of the House.
And thanks to Doug Jones’ win last year in Alabama, CNN admits that “a path now exists for Democrats to get back the majority” in the Senate as well, and at that point the gears of revenge begin to turn…
Hey...a boy can dream.
CHEERS to one less rat on the ship. Trey Gowdy, the guy everyone said was one of the wiliest lawyers in Congress right before he got his odd-shaped head handed to him when the Benghazi investigation he led turned up bupkus, is leaving Congress this year. Not due to a sex scandal (that we know of). Not to spend more time with his family. Not, amazingly, even to roll around in all the money he’ll make from the tax cuts for the rich he helped pass (though he will be doing that on weekends). No, it appears to be simpler than that. He’s planning to go from warming a House seat to warming one that’s a bit cushier:
If his judge skills are as good as his congressional investigation skills, expect to read lots of headlines in the Charleston Gazette about self-inflicted gavel injuries.
CHEERS to Maine's matchless movie maker. Happy 124th Birthday to director and Portland native (and son of immigrants) John Ford. He launched John Wayne's career and defined the classic American western with Stagecoach, The Searchers, the cavalry trilogy and gobs more. And then there's The Grapes of Wrath, which is in a class all by its amazing self:
He proclaimed in 1967: "I am a liberal Democrat and a rebel." If he were alive today I wonder if the GOP would brand him as Satan or an America-laster. (You’re right---probably both.)
CHEERS to casting a giant shadow. Yesterday morning the earth came between the sun and the moon (huge fight broke out at Starbucks---major drama), producing a rare super neato blue blood raccoon chainsaw goiter tiki hut moon. Here’s the Cliffs Notes version of what a chunk of the world saw (see more on twitter here) in the pre-dawn sky:
Figuring it was the signal for the Rapture, I sold all my possessions, drained my bank accounts, stripped nekkid, climbed the six-story maple tree in the back yard, smoked a foot-long doobie, and waited for the magic moment. Sorry to say it didn’t happen. But it wasn’t a total disaster. I won 50 bucks in a poker game with the squirrels.
CHEERS to"slide-rule portability." Tech geeks, fall to your knees and grovel before “the world’s first pocket calculator.” On February 1, 1972, the hand-held HP-35 ("challenges a computer!") made its debut. Cost: a mere $395. And it was made the old-fashioned way---in the USA. How quaint. Today's calculators are solar-powered, mainly because Detroit and the oil companies could never figure out a way to power 'em with internal combustion. If you get bored today (and if you made it this far down into C&J you must be): punch in 5318008, turn it upside down, call a phone number at random and read what you see to the person on the other end. But be mature about it.
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Ten years ago in C&J: February 1, 2008
CHEERS to us little people. Air America radio host Rachel Maddow has gotten a lot of face time on TV lately, and thankfully that's likely to continue. Recently she was interviewed by the Queerty blog, and her breakout appearance covering the Iowa caucuses on MSNBC sounds like what I go through every day with the front-pagers here:
“I had been expecting to anchor Air America’s coverage that night, but when MSNBC asked me to do it, I was like, "Oh, that’s really nice.
So, I showed up that night and walked into the make-up room and there are Kelly O’Donnell, an anchor I don’t know and Keith Olbermann sitting in the make-up room and I walked in and, like an idiot, without thinking, say, "Aw, I feel like I’m getting bumped up from the kid’s table at Thanksgiving."
Which was a dumb thing to say because A. self-deprecation doesn’t help in a professional context if you’re trying to seem like a bigger deal than you are and, B, I’m subliminally calling them old, which is not a nice thing. But that’s honestly how I felt: I get to be in the adult media! I do feel like---I dress like a first grader, I’m a big lesbian, I’m not pretty like a Barbie doll.”
Soul mates are we, Rachel. Minus the lesbian part.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to the process of elimination. No, I’m not talking about the upcoming midterm primary elections, silly. I’m talking about the subject of a movie destined to be cinema’s #1 in #2. Poop Talk!
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Opens February 15th. I think it’s going to start a movement.
Have a nice Thursday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
It’s unclear how much of Solo will be set in Cheers and Jeers, but certainly that’s where Han’s story will begin. There are strong rumors that the film will begin with Han as a kiddie pool splasher. Naturally, the life of a Kossack is unlikely to suit everyone’s favorite scoundrel.
---Star Wars News Network
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